Good Will to Men
by Sabari
Summary: A man working for MECH captures Bumblebee for Christmas. Somehow, kidnapping an Autobot just never works out how you'd expect. Possibly AU. Non slash/non-pairing.
1. Fool's Holiday

**_A/N: This story is set in season 2,_ _somewhere between "Operation: Bumblebee" and "Nemesis Prime"_**

 ** _As usual, I'm going to say this story is probably AU, though not intentionally so._** ** _As always, this story is completely written. As per usual, I will upload one chapter per day (Barring anything out of the ordinary. I will attempt to give readers a head's up via A/N). This was written for my entertainment, and is being published for yours. If you find yourself not enjoying it, then you should feel perfectly free to stop reading._**

 ** _Heap praise or criticism upon it, whichever may suit you best. Or say nothing about it at all, if you would prefer. Do feel free to point out typos; I check my stories before publishing, but I admit my imperfection and would welcome the opportunity to correct any mistakes I may have made._**

* * *

Snow lay like a cloud come to Earth, shimmering in the bright, cold mid-morning sunlight. It was a very beautiful sight, one Bumblebee was unable to appreciate as he drove along the uncleared road, repeatedly sinking into the snow and getting stuck in deep drifts, sometimes for minutes at a time until he was able to thrash his way free of them. Patrolling in the snow, he had discovered, was no fun.

Neither was patrolling alone, especially when he would otherwise have been picking Raf up from school. But the kids got time off for some Earth holiday, and that left Bumblebee free to patrol. Or investigate, as was most certainly the case in this particular instance.

For it was not idly that Bumblebee had been sent to this cold region where the roads often went without being cleared for days or even weeks at a time in the dead of winter. No. There had been signs of Decepticon activity, but nothing definite.

Optimus Prime had wisely decided to send his Scout to check it out before committing the majority of his forces to a battle which might not be forthcoming, or not worth fighting if it was. The other Autobots were not without tasks of their own to accomplish. All of them were investigating signs, to try and find out what the Decepticons were doing- and stop them.

Bumblebee couldn't help feeling he'd gotten the short end of the stick this time though. Not that he was complaining or feeling especially sorry for himself. It was a fact of life as an Autobot that sometimes you would be asked to do things you didn't want to do, or things which didn't at first make sense.

Still, he couldn't help but feel just a little bit displeased about mucking around in deep snow. It wasn't dangerously cold for him, but it was unpleasant nonetheless, and snow was finding its way into some very sensitive places where it then melted into icy water.

More out of need for distraction than anything, Bumblebee decided to tune in to Earth's radio stations. The first one he located was no help at all, because it was playing a song about letting it snow. Annoyed, he changed to another station, only to find another song pertaining to snow and cold and someone called Jack Frost nipping people's noses (which hardly seemed cause for song writing). After a couple more tries, he gave up. A distraction was probably a bad idea anyway, assuming there were really Decepticons somewhere in the vicinity.

Still, he wondered about the apparent world wide preoccupation with snow that had descended without apparent cause a few weeks ago. He'd been just as deeply baffled by the earlier concept of dressing up in costume and alternately throwing theme parties and going up to strangers and demanding candy. He wasn't sure which perplexed him more, but he was completely certain that the trigger for beginning the almost obsessive talking and decorating was an invisible one, just as whatever signaled the end of it all.

In a way, he understood this holiday even less than the other, because the obsession with snow seemed to exist in parts of the world where there was never any snow, and in the places where there was snow it hardly seemed a cause for celebration. Besides which, the snow had appeared long before the colored lights and men in red suits and all the other baffling things which Raf said accompanied this time of year. It simply didn't make a bit of sense to Bumblebee, but in that he knew he was not alone. None of the other Autobots understood it either.

But perhaps the thing he liked least about whatever was going on with humanity was what it seemed to be doing to Raf. The boy seemed sad, and perhaps even disappointed by Bee's lack of familiarity with the holiday. He had verbally assured Bee that it was alright, and he'd even changed the subject when the Scout had asked him what it was all about and how it worked, but Bumblebee knew there was something... painful about this time of year, but it seemed to only pain Raf and he wasn't sure why.

Bumblebee had noticed that the radio, television and internet had all become alive with references to the holiday season, which seemed more than a little misleading because he knew for a fact that Earth celebrated many holidays throughout the year, and it was very peculiar to have an entire season celebrating celebrations that happened at all times of the year. But Raf didn't explain it. He just turned off the radio, changed the TV channel and scrolled rapidly past any holiday posts online. Miko had lately taken to calling Raf 'Scrooge', but Jack had scolded her for it. Raf ignored her mostly, but Bee got the impression the monicker hurt his feelings, though it was unclear why.

Bumblebee realized that it was strange for him to be thinking of Raf while busy plowing through the snow in search of proof (or at least strong evidence) of Decepticon activity. He didn't typically allow his attention to be divided that way. It occurred to him that his focus was wavering, had been all day. And he knew why. Yesterday, when Raf had said goodbye, he'd reminded Bee that he wouldn't need to be picked up from school for awhile, and that it was unlikely the two of them would even see one another until after the holidays.

It wasn't habit that made him think of Raf now, but a sort of knowing without knowing. Something was wrong. But it wasn't Decepticon activity out here in the snow-driven landscape he was struggling to push through. He knew, with abrupt clarity, that he should go back. He shouldn't be out here, he should be back home with Raf. A feeling of dread crept across his consciousness, but he wasn't sure whether it was that he should not be here or that Raf should not be without his guardian. Either way, the feeling was enough to stop Bee in his tracks.

It was instinct, honed to a razor sharp edge by a lifetime of war, but he didn't listen to it soon enough. From somewhere off to his left came a bright flash, and he had no time to react before it overtook him. He felt the spark of electric impulse alien to his own beginning to interact with his systems, and then an abrupt surge that overloaded his systems. And then he knew nothing more.

* * *

As usual, the halls were decked, classical Christmas music emanated from the speakers in the living room and the smell of cookies baking wafted through the house. It was all very hard to ignore, especially the icicle lights on the neighbor's house Raf could see from his window. If he turned directly away from them, he would notice that they sprayed color across the wall of his room with the closet. Inside the closet was worse, his mother and both grandmothers insisted on knitting sweaters and scarves for him and all his siblings every year, and he was the unwilling recipient of the hand-me-downs in addition to the unwonted collection of his own.

It wasn't that he didn't like colored lights, or good Christmas music, or cookies. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate the effort it took to knit a sweater (though he was beginning to think it couldn't be too difficult, otherwise how would three women find the time to knit at least one for each child every year, often adding a scarf or pair of socks in with that?). It wasn't that he didn't enjoy getting presents. In fact, he loved everything about Christmas. Except for the fact that, in this time of togetherness, he always found himself alone.

He was too small to help with the lights, the kitchen too small and crowded to allow another person besides his mother and sisters to bake and decorate cookies, and nobody ever let him pick which Christmas CD was played next. His mother was possessive of the Christmas shopping, allowing not even her husband to aid her in gift selection for anyone, not even for the neighbors or his work friends. The irony of someone being so controlling and selfish about giving gifts was not lost on Raf.

As the youngest in the family, Raf wound up being the last to get to taste any of the cookies, and the last to get a mug of cocoa (whenever the month-long cookie baking project could be pushed aside enough to make room for cocoa making. It was a small kitchen, and a lot of cookies; most of which would be given as gifts). If there was a cookie that was just not as nice as the others, Raf wound up with it. And the last of the cocoa was just never quite as well stirred and he'd wind up with powdery chunks of chocolate in the bottom of his mug. And there were never enough marshmallows left for him.

Basically, Raf's only complaint about Christmas centered on his not being allowed to actually participate, or being the last one anyone considered, if they had the time left after having considered everybody else. He didn't think it was too selfish to want to not be the last one on the list sometimes.

Over the years, he'd just gotten tired of hearing all this great stuff about giving and togetherness when he knew that none of that was for him. He could be good at gift giving, if someone would just give him the chance to try. He knew how to find anything anyone could possibly want online. And maybe he'd be good at cookie decorating too... if he ever got the chance. And would it kill anybody to listen to the Christmas music he liked for once? After all, the classical music playing now was his mother's preference, but all the people involved in the cookie making would get to take a turn, and they all had different taste in music.

Somehow, Raf had just gotten tired of watching Christmas happen without him, and it had finally gotten to the point that even the sight of Christmas lights sickened him because they just reminded him of how left out he felt, how ignored, how forgotten.

He wouldn't want to lose any of his family members or trade them in, but he still wished his family were smaller somehow. Everyone with smaller families seemed to get to actually enjoy the holiday _with_ their family, instead of being shunted off to his room where he would be 'out of the way'. Somehow, it just wasn't enough to get to open a few presents on Christmas. He wanted the rest of Christmas, as everyone else seemed to experience it, instead of being on the outside looking in.

But, apparently, that was too much to ask.

Raf almost envied the Autobots their ignorance. In fact, he'd been sort of hoping that Bee would pick up on his misery and offer to hang out with him during Christmas break. But, perceptive as the Autobot Scout was, this seemed beyond his ability to understand. Maybe Raf should have explained Christmas to Bumblebee, then maybe the Scout would understand why the holiday made him sad.

After all, Bumblebee always listened, always cared, but still he wasn't psychic or human. It was definitely too much to ask him to be either of those things.

* * *

Ratchet was the first of the Autobots to become aware that Bumblebee was missing.

The first indication of something wrong was that the Scout missed his scheduled radio check in. Ratchet didn't immediately become alarmed. As good as Bumblebee was about checking in, there were sometimes extenuating circumstances which prevented an Autobot in the field from being on time, especially when they were looking into possible Decepticon activity.

But minutes ticked away without the Scout's checking in. Rather than call him, potentially making a noise which could expose Bumblebee if he was hiding for some reason, such as if he were spying on Decepticons, Ratchet checked the GPS. It was then that he found out that, while Bumblebee's life signal was coming in strong and steady, his location registered as unknown. His GPS system must have been disabled, because there was no place on Earth Ratchet couldn't track him.

It was time to call Optimus and let him know their Scout was missing, and very probably in trouble.

* * *

 ** _A/N:_**

 _ **As with my Christmas fics the past two years, all the chapter titles are taken from lyrics of Christmas songs. If you want to know what one is, feel free to ask, as many of them have to be a little vague in order to apply to the story as well as avoid using the same song twice. So far, I haven't had to repeat, but if a yearly Christmas fic becomes tradition, it'll happen sooner or later. There's only so many Christmas songs out there :P**_

 _ **I usually start these in October because November is a bit busy for writing and I want to be finished by December. This year, October was pretty hectic, so if the story gets a little wibbly in places, that would be why and I apologize, but I feel I've done the best I could.**_


	2. Train

Bumblebee awoke to a grayish semi-darkness, and a steady sense of being in motion, and no idea how much time had passed since he had last been conscious. As he gained awareness, Bumblebee realized he was inside of something, a metal box of some kind, with slats in the sides which permitted thin light to seep in, revealing a stark, empty interior. The next thing he discovered was that he was still in vehicle mode. All four wheels had been booted to prevent them from turning, and heavy chains were secured over and around him. When he attempted to transform, he discovered just how heavy and tightly secured those chains were, for they prevented him from doing so.

This surprised him somewhat. The very fact that he was being restrained in this way spoke of human captors. No self-respecting Decepticon would ever try to hold an Autobot in this particular fashion for long. Certainly they would not transport a prisoner in this way. But Bumblebee had never known a human-created chain to be strong enough to hold him, or indeed any Cybertronian. If he could have transformed, the wheel clamps would have snapped right off. But, because he couldn't, he was unable to turn his wheels, so he couldn't break loose that way.

After his brief but enthusiastic attempt at escape, Bumblebee settled down.

He tried his comm unit, but it wasn't functional. That didn't surprise him. Anyone who knew how to tie him down so he couldn't transform would also know how to disable, break or somehow block the signal of a comm unit. Restraining a Cybertronian wasn't easy, you had to know exactly how the transformation process worked, and that wasn't exactly obvious when a Cybertronian was in vehicle mode. Still, he wasn't exactly worried. The comm unit was exposed and obvious in vehicle mode, because it sat in the same place as the radio of a normal Earth vehicle. The GPS wasn't so exposed, but he couldn't access it to tell where he was, so he figured that the Autobots couldn't track him either.

Having exhausted the conventional means of signaling distress and figuring out where he was, Bumblebee adjusted his focus onto his makeshift prison. 'Shift' being the operative word, because he knew he was moving. And there was a familiarity to the motion, only he couldn't quite pin it down. Even the rattling noise that seemed to come from somewhere underneath him, as well as all around, didn't quite identify what it was.

It was only when he heard the whistle that Bumblebee realized what it was. It was a sound he'd recorded permanently into his memory when he'd been learning the rules of driving on Earth. The distinctive whistle was that of a train approaching a rail crossing.

Bumblebee then realized he was inside of a train car. The flickering light through the slates was caused by passing various sources of light and shadow, the rattling was caused by the wheels on the rails. Bumblebee had never been inside a train before, but he had been _on top_ of one.

Now he knew for certain that humans were behind this. No Cybertronian would ever voluntarily travel this way, or transport anything by train. Not Earth trains anyway. It was simply the least practical way to travel, even if you were trying to be secretive about it.

A shudder rippled through Bumblebee when he realized the only possible party responsible for his current situation. Only one group of humans had the knowledge, ability and inclination to take Cybertronians captive, much less hold them once captured. MECH.

There were few things Bumblebee feared. Almost ever since the Autobots had first encountered them, MECH had been one of those things. Though the fear had not really manifested itself until he had seen firsthand the butchery of which they were not only capable, but willing. MECH had no recognition of Cybertronians as living, feeling creatures. They had no compunction about ripping out wires, optics or T-Cogs, nor any preference about Autobot or Decepticon victims.

Bumblebee made a nervous buzzing sound.

Whatever MECH's plan was now, Bumblebee knew he wanted no part of it. He trembled at the memory of how they had not only maimed the Decepticon Breakdown, but also the violation they had committed upon Bumblebee's own person. Even with his T-Cog restored, the psychological trauma of that event had been difficult to recover from. Megatron may have silenced his voice and left him to die, but MECH had left him alive but both useless and utterly defenseless, not to mention removing an organic part of who and what he was. Even restored and returned, his T-Cog wasn't the same as it had been before. Bumblebee sensed it really never would be again.

He was not ashamed to admit to himself that he was afraid of what MECH might do to him now. Despite what the children seemed to think when the Autobots showed terror at the sight of a scraplet, there was no shame in admitting to rational, fully justified fear of something. Just so long as you didn't allow that fear to impede your ability to function as a soldier.

In this instance, Bumblebee had already done everything he could to escape for now. The only thing left to do was wait. Wait, and try not to let his fear build. That was hard when you had nothing else to occupy your thoughts. But this was not Bumblebee's first stint as a POW, nor was it the first time he had been on his own, without any backup, without anyone knowing where he was.

* * *

"Six hours without contact," Arcee remarked, crossing her arms worriedly, "That's not good."

It was an understatement, they all knew it, but nobody remarked on it. The uncomfortable truth was that this was not the first time Bumblebee had gone missing. Unfortunately, he was a reliable, trustworthy Scout, and very good at what he did. To be out six hours without contact was not in his character. If there had been any way at all of contacting the Autobots, he'd have found it. A good Scout went to any lengths to report his findings, and Bumblebee was nothing if not a good Scout. When Bumblebee went out of contact, it was never for any minor reason. He was in trouble.

"You think the 'Cons got hold of him?" Bulkhead wondered.

"At a guess, I'd say no," Ratchet answered.

"Bumblebee has fallen into Decepticon hands before," Optimus said, "It is doubtful he would do so again without a fight."

"But there was no sign of a struggle at his last known coordinates," Arcee said, "What few tracks hadn't been destroyed by the snow storms in the area just seemed to stop in the middle of nowhere."

"Capture by the 'Cons without a trace," Bulkhead acknowledged, "Seems unlikely."

"But who does that leave?" Ratchet asked, "Who besides the Decepticons could effect such a capture?"

"We do not yet know for certain what has become of our Scout," Optimus reminded them, "Capture is likely, but far from certain. With no tracks to follow, and no GPS location, there is little we can do to find him. If Bumblebee is to be found, he must first contact us. Until then, we must be wary and alert. It is possible Bumblebee was not the only target."

"'Far from certain'?" Arcee practically yelped, before regaining her normally respectful tone, "What else would make him cut off contact besides being caught?"

"Granted, it is the most likely cause for his sudden silence, and we must act under the assumption that someone has captured Bumblebee. But there are other possibilities which we would be unwise to rule out or ignore," Optimus replied calmly.

He was right, of course.

In the hunt for intel, Bumblebee could have become reckless. If a Space Bridge was activated and he went through or was somehow forced through, he would have seemingly disappeared without a trace, and be beyond communication. But he should also have been beyond range for receiving his life signal as well. And there should have been energy traces from the Space Bridge.

Potentially the Decepticons had developed a new technology which masked GPS and blocked comm units. That was likely, and Bumblebee could just as easily wind up on the other side of a Ground Bridge as a Space Bridge and find himself in a shielded location unexpectedly. And they all knew that Bumblebee was good at getting into places unnoticed. It would not be the first time he'd piggybacked on a Decepticon Bridge without their noticing. Nor would it be the first time he took action without appropriate caution and then found himself in over his head. To a certain degree, a good Scout _had_ to be reckless, willing to do things no saner or more cautious Autobot would dare. A Scout had to be willing to do just about anything to acquire intel, and then to relay what he had learned.

Though the thought of MECH had crossed all their minds, they didn't want to voice that possibility, especially not when that human organization had done such terrible things, most recently to Bumblebee. They didn't want to even consider the possibility that Bumblebee had broken contact because he had been (or was currently being) dismantled piece by piece. It was too barbaric for even Megatron to consider, and they didn't want to think of the Scout suffering at MECH's hands. Again.

Though nobody said it, they all felt grateful that school was out. None of them wanted to be the one to tell Raf that his best friend was missing, possibly being tortured... or worse. Hopefully, the next time they heard from Raf, all of this would be over and done with, and Bumblebee would be back among them, safe and sound. The only thing worse than not knowing where Bumblebee was or what was happening to him would be having to admit to the human boy that they couldn't save the Scout.

* * *

Raf had debated all morning and most of the afternoon about whether or not to contact Bumblebee. He didn't want to bother the Scout, especially not if the Autobots were busy with something. But if Bee was just patrolling or something, he might welcome someone to talk to, or listen to anyway. Bee had mentioned the loneliness of patrolling on at least one occasion when Raf had mentioned not wanting to bug him by calling him and talking to him all the time.

Bumblebee had a way of not only inviting Raf to talk to and spend time with him, but making it feel like he wasn't just being generous. Bee acted like he genuinely enjoyed Raf's company. It had taken awhile, but Raf eventually believed him when Bee said that he liked hanging out with him, even if it was just sitting nearby while Raf did homework (though Raf often spent more time explaining it to Bee than actually doing the homework. The Scout made no secret of his interest in learning about Earth; though Raf had initially harbored suspicion that he was just being nice about listening to the boy ramble on about science, history, math and all the other courses he was taking).

Even so, Christmas was a time to be with family. Raf wondered what Bumblebee might think of him if it appeared he didn't want to do that. Miko already made fun of him for his aversion to Christmas. One thing he didn't want was to hear about it from Bee too.

On the other hand, unless he'd been doing solo research (unlikely), Bumblebee knew absolutely nothing about Christmas or any of the December holidays. Unlike everyone else Raf knew, Bumblebee would be perfectly safe to talk to, because he wouldn't know the difference unless Raf told him.

That felt kind of deceitful, and that definitely wasn't in keeping with the holiday spirit, but Raf felt like explaining it would sound an awful lot like just complaining. He knew Bumblebee would listen patiently regardless, but Raf didn't like to be the type of person who complained all the time.

When he finally got up the nerve to actually call Bee, he was surprised that the Scout didn't answer immediately. He was more surprised when the Scout didn't answer at all. He knew there were countless reasons Bee might be too busy, but there had never been a time when the Scout had failed to respond in fairly short order when Raf called him.

He had no reason to suspect anything was wrong, but deep inside he felt troubled. He knew Bee would never ignore him, not for any reason. The only reason he wasn't answering was because he couldn't. And Raf knew, without anyone needing to tell him, that something was terribly wrong.

* * *

 _ **A/N: I don't typically do this, but I have no other means of responding to this person's review and I think it's important to address (If you have an account and a question, I recommend you log in before posting a question in a review. I'm more likely to answer in a message than an A/N as I feel these break up the flow of the story). They wondered if I came from a large family. Mine is large-ish and multigeneration (grandparents, parents and kids all under the same roof). A few of the things Raf thinks about/refers to over the course of this story are based on personal experience (or at least how certain things felt/looked to me when I was twelve), but mostly I was following a line in the series itself. More than once in the series, Raf referred to being forgotten in his own family. Usually in a large family, it's not the youngest who gets left out as described, but actually the middle child who gets forgotten in the shuffle of the big kids being able to do things on their own and the little ones needing help (or at least it feels that way, speaking as a middle child whose older siblings were five years and more older than me and whose younger sibling was less than two years younger and also mentally/physically handicapped).**_

 _ **In an ideal family situation, which mine probably approached (at least when I was little), there's time for everybody and everybody is looking out for everybody else. But that's not what was described in the**_ **Transformers: Prime** _ **series by Raf. I do get that it's a bit of an overdone plot device that a child in a large family gets forgotten, but it can happen and -in this case- I was following what the series itself gave me to work with, not just making something up for the sake of plot convenience (I'm guilty of it sometimes, but not in this instance).**_

 _ **Remember that someone's perspective may or may not be accurate to reality. And that goes for us "real" people, as well as fictional characters ;)**_

 _ **Thank you for reading, and I hope that cleared up the question regarding Raf and his family.**_


	3. Poison in the Blood

The train had stopped, the rail-car Bumblebee was trapped inside detached and pushed off to a siding. For hours there had been activity outside, but the car itself and Bumblebee inside went ignored. Bumblebee made no sound to attract attention. He couldn't. Outside there were humans, who might or might not know of Cybertronians. Even if he got their attention, Bumblebee could do nothing to convince them to free him, not without revealing the truth of what he was. Even if he did that, they would not be able to understand him. Only one human had ever understood him, and that was Raf.

If they were MECH, Bumblebee was not keen to remind them of his presence. He much preferred them to ignore him, forever if at all possible. He'd rather die of rust than have MECH take him apart.

But, as night fell, there came some loud shouting. The side door of the rail car was slid open and artificial light flooded the inside of it. Bumblebee's visual sensors were momentarily dazzled. Once they adjusted, he saw a man had climbed up into the car and now stood, his face turned to shadow by the back-lighting so that Bumblebee couldn't see his expression.

"My, you are a beautiful vehicle, aren't you?" the voice was unfamiliar, the intonation cold.

Bumblebee did not respond, not even to burr irritably.

"It's too bad you must be conscious to function," the masculine voice continued, "It would be better for you if there were another way."

That sounded ominous, but Bumblebee refused to make a sound that would reveal his fear. There was no shame in being afraid, but nothing good had ever come of letting the enemy know you feared them. And Bumblebee had no doubt but that this shadowy figure was for some reason his enemy.

Someone on the ground got the man in the rail-car's attention. He turned and the person on the ground passed something up to him. In the unhelpful lighting, it looked very much like a car battery.

Bumblebee felt a panic welling up in him then. If his hood was lifted, he possessed something which looked to a human like a car battery, but that was a disguise just as his vehicle mode was. What was actually inside the casing very much needed to remain attached if he was going to continue 'functioning', as the man had put it. If they intended to pull it out and replace it with that car battery... Bumblebee didn't want to imagine the pain he would suffer as a result, but he did it anyway.

As the man approached, Bumblebee issued a burring growl and shifted gears. His engine roared to life and, in his panic, he attempted to fly into reverse despite the physical impossibility of it. He felt his body straining to meet his demands, but couldn't break the hold of the wheel clamps and chains.

"See? See, this is why it would be better if you were unconscious," the man said, "Because you cannot be allowed to resist. Not after tonight. Once I have finished, you will obey, like it or not."

Bumblebee liked the sound of that even less than anything he had heard up to now. He shifted gears and tried to launch forward, with no success. He hurled himself at his chains in an attempt to transform, but they gave him no room to do it and held fast when he tried to break them.

Even as Bumblebee continued to struggle, the man came up to his hood and tried to unlatch it. Bumblebee was having none of that, not willingly anyway. At his resistance, the man turned and called up some help. Bumblebee had in reality very little strength when it came to keeping his hood closed, and a few men with crowbars were able to pry it loose. Unable to see beneath his own hood, Bumblebee's horror increased tenfold. The not knowing what they were doing, the fear of the pain he was certain was coming, the overwhelming sense of doom only served as fuel for his continued panic and he kept fighting his restraints even though he knew it served no purpose and would only damage him if he kept on doing it. But he found he couldn't make himself stop, he was too frightened.

"Now don't worry," the man said, "I'm not going to dismantle you. I'm only going to control you."

Bumblebee didn't find that at all reassuring. The next thing he felt was a wire being cut. He almost wailed, more from shock than pain, but instead he growled, and his engine roared in response. It didn't do him any good, there was nothing he could do. But that had never stopped him from trying before.

Bumblebee understood now what was happening, though he wasn't sure how or why. Whatever that object was, it was being wired in with the intent of making it possible for a human to have physical control. To Bumblebee, that was perhaps an even more horrifying prospect. He'd been controlled before, and he hadn't much cared for it then. He only hoped that this wouldn't be as bad as having Megatron in his head. It seemed unfair to have to think of it that way, but the only way he could find to stifle the panic and regain his composure was remembering what literally having Megatron in his head had been like and realizing that -whatever happened next- it wouldn't be as bad as that had been.

Calming himself, Bumblebee finally cut his engine and quit thrashing. It hadn't been doing any good, and had only served to strain parts of him that weren't designed for it. He wasn't giving up, merely biding his time. He could not get away now, had proved that beyond any doubt. It wouldn't do any good to tear himself apart trying.

* * *

" _We are a little busy right now, Rafael,"_ Ratchet was the one who picked up when Raf called the base.

Raf skipped apologizing and asking what was up and got right to the point, "Is Bee okay?"

There was a pause. Ratchet seldom paused before answering unless the person he was talking to wouldn't like what he had to say. Even then, it only happened when he himself didn't like what he had to say either. Raf felt his stomach tighten with worry. He'd only suspected something was wrong before. Now he knew. He waited, trying not to get too worried before he knew what was wrong. The first part of the pause could just signal some sort of defeat, like maybe Bee wasn't picking up because he felt badly about it. But the pause lengthened, and Raf had begun to suspect the worst by the time Ratchet finally answered.

" _We... ah... don't know. Bumblebee broke radio contact, and we've lost tracking on him. We're trying to find him right now,"_ Ratchet said finally.

"Bring me over," Raf said immediately, "I want to help."

" _If I believed you could, I would welcome the help. But frankly I don't see how-"_

"At least let me try," Raf insisted.

There was another pause. Ratchet knew better than to question Raf's ability to use technology to accomplish his goals. If anyone could find Bumblebee using Earth tech, it was Raf. Ratchet might be the expert with Cybertronian technology, but Raf could use Earth tech far more efficiently. If they'd lost track of Bee, it was possible that using satellite tech might help. Possibly even just tapping into street cameras in the area or something. Ratchet knew better than to turn down the offer.

" _Alright. I'll send Bulkhead to pick you up."_

"I'll be waiting," Raf replied.

* * *

It didn't take long for the man to finish whatever it was he'd been doing and close the hood. Bumblebee flinched at his hood being slammed down the way you would with a car that was old and broken. Slamming the hood like that was a good way to _make_ a car old and broken before its time and Bumblebee especially didn't care for the loud noise that reverberated through him as a result. He buzzed a sharp protest, but he didn't bother to articulate because the man wouldn't have understood his words anyway.

"Sound effects will get you nowhere but in trouble," the man said, walking around to the driver's side and opening the door.

Bumblebee wouldn't have let him do it... only he couldn't seem to stop him. A prickle of new unease and knowing dread struck him, and he tried to turn over his engine – only to find out he couldn't. He told himself not to panic. Whatever he did, he must not panic. Still, he couldn't quit the internal trembling. He didn't like this, nor where it was going... wherever that was.

When the man slid into the seat behind the steering wheel, Bumblebee finally got a good look at him. It didn't help. Bee didn't recognize him, and he looked like a normal sort of person. Not real tall, not real short, medium build, brown hair, ordinary sort of face, somewhere near his forties or fifties probably. He was the kind of human Bumblebee would probably not recognize in a lineup.

It occurred to the Scout that the man's voice hadn't been overly menacing or apologetic, just sort of generic and unassuming. Maybe he didn't realize how cruel he was being, or how violated Bumblebee now felt, or how scared the Scout was. Not that Bee had any means of conveying that.

Pulling out a small tool, the man leaned over the dash and started prying out Bee's comm unit. Almost involuntarily, Bee began to buzz protests, even though he knew it wouldn't do any good.

"We can't have this being accidentally reactivated," the man explained, "Besides, something else needs to be installed here."

That sounded ominous, and Bee fell silent as the comm unit was pulled out and handed off to another man who'd climbed up into the rail-car without Bee's noticing. It was traded for something that looked almost like it, but Bumblebee knew it wasn't. As it was pushed into place, he felt the wrongness of it against him. And then he felt a faint spark of electricity, and he liked that even less.

"Once this is hooked up," the man explained, "It will be possible to use it to send a pulse through you systems, just in case you get any ideas."

Ideas? What ideas? Bumblebee was now paralyzed, what ideas could he possibly have?

"Once you understand how all of this works, you may be tempted to defy your driver by cutting power," the man said, as if reading Bee's mind, "I'd advise against that."

Bee puzzled over that statement and what it had to do with the device that was being plugged into him until the man had it all set up.

"What I did first was prevent you from initiating actions. This will stop you from refusing to do so."

With that, he pressed the button on the device.

Electricity shot through Bumblebee like a bolt of lightning, and white-hot pain accompanied it. Bumblebee let out a squeal that wasn't entirely voluntary, and a shudder ripped through him as the electricity dispersed through him. It was so intense his sensors blacked out and, for a moment, he couldn't perceive anything but the pain. Even once it subsided, he still felt it pulsing faintly, carried on the energon in his veins. His visual and auditory capabilities seemed to creep back cautiously, and he realized only a second or so had actually passed. It was enough of a demonstration.

"I don't want to use that option if I don't have to," the man said, "But I must ensure your absolute obedience before I give you to my children. I want them safe, you see. Absolutely and completely. To make it perfectly clear to you: if this button is pushed repeatedly or for too long, it will kill you. I hope that's enough of an incentive for you to behave."

Bumblebee burred a quiet affirmative, even though he knew the man couldn't understand him.

"But don't worry," the man continued, "My kids haven't broken a Christmas present since they were very little, especially not one so unique and obviously expensive as yourself. You'll be well cared for."

For some reason, Bumblebee found that not at all reassuring.


	4. Soul Felt Its Worth

Before long, Bumblebee found that whatever had been attached under his hood didn't really seem to be hurting him; that is, aside from the profound feeling of violation and lack of ability to control himself. He felt normal, had all the power he usually did... only now he couldn't use it. That device, whatever it was, acted as a leash, holding him until he was released by the driver behind the steering wheel.

He didn't try to fight back with resistance.

One lesson was all it took to get the point across to him that he didn't want that button on the dash pressed. It wasn't worth it. He'd have his chance to get free, but the time wasn't now, the place wasn't here. Patience wasn't exactly his strong suit, but he'd been forced to use it before.

It was long past dark before Bumblebee found himself being directed out of the train station and out onto the open road, the man who'd addressed him earlier still behind the wheel. Once Bee had been removed from the rail-car and put on the ground, the man behind the wheel had put him through his paces like a reining horse. With a turn of the wheel, the device inside him sent a signal that he was released to turn right or left, but he had to initiate that action for himself after getting the request to do so. It turned out that Bumblebee was astonishingly bad at taking directions, but his driver was patient with him, evidently as reluctant to push the button on the dash as Bee was to have that done.

Hours of turns, starts, stops, accelerations and U-turns later, they were out on the road, beyond sight of the other men who'd been hanging around and watching. Evidently, their part in this was through.

"You're going to have to respond faster in future than you did today," the driver said, "You know the steering wheel in here must be directly responsible for the turning of your front wheels out there, right? A slow response will never do, especially not with my kids. You see, they won't know where I got you."

Bumblebee's speed faltered for a beat before he leveled out. Today had been very alarming and deeply confusing, but this statement somehow was the one that took the cake for him. He had assumed that the Decepticon activity had been a deception to lure him in, and that he'd been caught by MECH, for use in one of their experiments. It had become clear over the course of the day that wasn't the case, that he was to be given to this man's children for some reason. But still he'd assumed they were intent on getting their hands on a Cybertronian. What would they want with him if they thought he was just a regular -if rather expensive- car?

"My kids have a tendency to be reckless," the driver said, "And I want the best for them. I happen to know that transformers are made of much sterner stuff than any Earth vehicle. You're faster, more maneuverable and much tougher than any vehicle on the market. Whatever my kids get into, I believe they'll be far safer in a transformer than any ordinary car."

Bee suddenly missed the time early this morning when everything had made sense to him.

"I _do_ work for MECH, if that's what you're wondering. Getting you was basically a holiday bonus."

Some bonus. Bumblebee didn't say anything.

"I knew from the moment I first saw you that you were the answer to my problems."

Did he even hear himself? This was the craziest, shakiest, most broken line of reasoning Bee had ever heard, and he'd heard some real doozies. He felt like there was some piece of information he wasn't being given, something he hadn't been told yet.

"Besides," the man said after a momentary pause, "who wouldn't want one of your kind sitting in his garage? I mean, how incredible are you, right?"

There it was.

"Best part is, you're the one that never talks. Oh, don't be surprised. MECH knows a lot about your kind, and you especially. What? You thought the only thing we did when we had you was take your T-Cog? We had the time, of _course_ we took a good look at you."

Bumblebee shuddered so that his engine hiccuped and almost stalled before he got himself under control again. It didn't matter that he hadn't been pained, or even aware of what was happening to him. He still felt assaulted in a way that was intensely personal, his self had been invaded in a way he couldn't entirely describe. It wasn't like someone sitting in the driver's seat or a passenger seat. That was normal for him, and he was able to cope with it even if it was a stranger or someone he didn't want to be there. But that someone had opened him up and taken a piece of him... of what made him what he was... he'd never be sure whether he despised MECH or Megatron more. After all, though the latter had tortured him and actually literally gotten inside his head, the first was just a product of war and the other was because Megatron hadn't had another option if he wanted to obtain consciousness again. What MECH had done... that was different. Knowing that they'd also poked at his mangled voice box while they were at it only made him feel more violated. Somehow the casual way this man talked about it only made it worse. He talked as if Bumblebee were no more alive than the train which had brought him here, like taking his T-Cog hadn't been any more wrong than taking a tire off an Earth car.

Yet some part of him had to know Bumblebee was a thinking, feeling creature. Otherwise, bridling his power wouldn't seem necessary, nor would he now be attempting to explain his reasons for what he'd done. Unfortunately, because of his speech impediment, Bee couldn't try to reach the part of this man that knew what he was doing was wrong. Bumblebee was a thing alive, with free will. But if the man knew, he didn't believe, otherwise he would not be doing this to Bee.

Bumblebee was tired from the long day, and almost missed the signal to turn in to a driveway. Lit in the headlights, it looked for a moment as though he was being asked to drive into a pit of pure darkness. Then he turned, and realized the concrete driveway -wide enough for two cars his size to drive next to each other- went steeply downward. He went downhill, rolling all the way to a large square of concrete in front of a garage. It wasn't quite level, ensuring that any rain would run off to the right of the garage, but it was functionally flat. The man pulled out a key ring and pushed a button that made one of the garage doors slide up to reveal the large interior. Bee's headlights illuminated the clean concrete flooring and walls, along with two other vehicles and the space for a potential third and fourth.

He was turned around and backed into the garage, a huge black SUV on his right and a sleek silver sports car on his left. On the other side of the SUV was space for another vehicle, and there might have been one hidden behind it for all Bee knew.

Bumblebee choked a little when the man put him in park and then cut the engine and pulled out the key which worked in tandem with the device he'd attached to Bee. From the outside, it looked just the same as turning on any ordinary car. Under the surface, a much more complex operation took place. The key slid into the ignition and a computer inside of it communicated with the computer in the other device and sent the signal to turn over the engine when the key was turned.

"It's late," the man said as he shut the door, "the kids are asleep. You'll meet them in the morning."

He then stepped back, pressed the garage door button again and stood there until it rattled shut. Bee heard him walk across the concrete area to the first of several staircases that led up to the mansion on the hill, which Bumblebee had barely glimpsed as he was driving in.

Once the sound of footsteps was gone, Bumblebee knew he was well and truly alone. It was dark, and there was nothing he could do, so he decided to try to rest, hopefully take a stasis nap to pass the time. He knew that at some point he would have to figure out how to break free, but he was tired now, and he'd already spent much of the day trying to think how to escape and he'd gotten nowhere.

Bumblebee knew that driving himself crazy trying to think of a way out when there clearly wasn't one right now wouldn't do him any good. This wasn't the first time he'd had to sleep in what he considered to be hostile territory. He had the uneasy feeling that it also wouldn't be the last.

At least he now knew what he was to this man. Like the vehicles on either side of him and the big mansion on the hill, Bumblebee was a trophy, his worth measured by the difficulty and expense inherent in acquiring him. He was just a thing to this man. An extremely valuable thing, but just that and nothing more. His worth to this man could be measured in dollars. He didn't know what good that information might be, but he decided that it was better than the not knowing. And, he supposed, it was better than any of the other times he'd been caught and imprisoned. The objective wasn't to take anything from him. Anything, that is, except for his freedom, which he was understandably rather fond of. Still, the loss of freedom was an inherent part of being a prisoner. If that was the worst of it, Bumblebee could think of times when he'd been in much worse situations.

That didn't mean he liked it, or that he found it easy to relax in the enemy's camp.

* * *

There had been no traffic cameras in the area Bumblebee had been driving when he was captured, so there was no visual record of what had happened to him. That wasn't surprising, as every enemy of the Autobots was just as eager to remain secret as they themselves were. Still, it was disappointing that the last sighting of Bee was that of a street light cam about thirty miles from where he would have been when he missed the check in, assuming he'd ever gotten that far. The wind-driven snow had done a good job at covering his tracks, making it hard to tell exactly how far he'd gotten before whatever happened to him... happened.

Raf had quickly linked in to the nearest cameras in all directions and spent hours rolling them back up to the time stamp on the camera which had last picked him up. He could only guess at when Bee had been caught, and he might not have been transported for some time after that. It took awhile to go through all of that. Once he had, Raf knew Bumblebee hadn't driven out on any road that had a traffic cam, nor had he been towed. That only cut down the possibilities. Bumblebee wasn't exactly confined to the roads, nor were any of the Decepticons.

Something about this didn't seem like the 'Cons. What would they need with an Autobot prisoner now? If it was for information, they had to know that it was a waste of time to capture Bumblebee, who had already resisted whatever torture Megatron could dish out. Even if they used the cortical psychic patch, what could Bumblebee possibly know that was worth the risk of taking him prisoner? Autobots were well known for their willingness to go to almost any length to save one of their own. They would be relentless and also ruthless in their search. They were not above killing Decepticons, especially not when they were hunting for one of their missing. It was a huge risk to take an Autobot prisoner; militarily it was unwise as the danger far outweighed the potential for reward, assuming they could keep their hands on Bee long enough to get what they wanted out of him.

When Raf mentioned it, Ratchet seemed to agree with him, but was unwilling to speak of the only other possible explanation. But Raf could see the unspoken fear in the Autobot medic's eyes. MECH, who had as much regard for Cybertronian life as Decepticons had for humans. Decepticons in human skin.

If they had Bumblebee, things were worse than Raf had feared.


	5. Not Like Christmas At All

It had snowed some time during the night, and the garage door was frozen shut. Bumblebee was jolted to reality by the grating sound of the machinery groaning and failing in its attempt to perform its designed function. Eventually, the noise shut off, and the side door was opened, searing artificial light snapped on overhead, momentarily blinding Bumblebee's vision, which was adjusted to the absolute darkness. Shifting his vision until he could see properly, Bumblebee wasn't surprised to find three people walking in from around behind the giant SUV, the man plus two younger people. The girl looked about fifteen or sixteen, the boy a little shy of eighteen maybe.

"Rick, Fina," said the man Bee had met yesterday, "This is your early Christmas present."

"Dad," said the boy, presumably Rick, "We already _have_ cars."

"Get behind the wheel of this one once, and you'll never want to use the Jag again."

"Oh great," the girl, Fina, said as she crossed her arms, "Now he can get even bigger speeding tickets. And what do I get out of it?"

"Well, you'll never get stuck in the middle of nowhere because you forgot to gas it up."

"Why not? Does it run on fairy dust?" Fina challenged.

"Something like that," the man replied with a slight smile.

Rick had approached the driver's side, and Bumblebee felt a crawling sensation inside which made him wish he could move away. Something about the boy made him instantly wary and he didn't want that kid behind the wheel of any vehicle, let alone _him_. There was something dangerous in his dark eyes.

Both kids looked like their father, but Rick's hair was darker and Fina's was much longer and had been dyed green at the tips. Both had dark brown eyes and similar faces. Now he got a better look, Bee wouldn't have been surprised if they'd been twins. He realized it didn't matter. They were old enough to drive, which was the only really relevant thing from his perspective.

"I'll give you that this car looks cool," Rick said, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets "But I don't see what makes it better than the Jaguar."

Bumblebee tried not to be insulted. He'd had the option to choose a Jaguar as his vehicle mode, but what he'd picked was better and he knew it. Still, it shouldn't matter to him what this kid thought. Even so, he felt his ego take a bit of a bruising. In spite of himself, he felt a crooked hope spring up that Rick would get the chance to find out firsthand what it was to drive a car like Bee. It was a stupid hope, when he should have been wanting only to get free, but he couldn't help it, he was proud of his choice.

"It's faster," Rick's father said quickly, "Safer, more reliable and almost as close to being an all-terrain vehicle as the SUV," he nodded towards the enormous black car that sat like a sleeping leviathan, "You'll see for yourself once they clear the roads and we get the garage door de-iced."

"Oh good, now Rick can kill himself _before_ Christmas," Fina scoffed.

"Like you care," Rick shot back, moving quickly to give his sister a shove.

"That's not funny, Fina," their father said, "Rick, don't push your sister."

It did no good, because Fina returned the shove with a slap.

"Stop that, both of you! Otherwise neither of you will get to drive this car before New Year's."

"Ooh, what a threat," Fina spat, "Guess I'll just have to drive the convertible."

"Which is currently in the repair shop after you forgot to put it in 'park' when you went shopping last week," her father said her helpfully.

"Daddy!" Fina practically yelled, but she didn't seem to have anything else to say for a moment before managing, "the SUV's still here."

"And you'll drive it over his dead body," Rick seemed to be reminding her.

Bumblebee felt slightly sick.

It was one thing to be forced to drive around under someone else's control, but these two would get him or themselves killed inside of a week if one of them got behind the wheel. He felt the fear of yesterday beginning to reassert itself. Already he was beginning to feel responsible for their lives, yet he knew there would be nothing he could do to stop them from hurting themselves. Bumblebee knew, perhaps better than anyone, that he was not indestructible.

"Now, now," the man interrupted before his kids could continue, "I do need to explain one unique feature of this car."

 _Only one?_ Bee thought, but then he understood.

"Now, on the outside this car's just like any of its model. But it does have a few quirks. All it boils down to is, if it's acting up, there's a button on the dash that should get it going right again. Just be careful you don't overuse that button or you might burn out the circuits."

Cute explanation, Bee wondered if it made any kind of actual sense. Somehow, being a car didn't exactly inspire him to know a whole lot about them, any more than being human inspired people to learn biology.

"Now, it should just be a temporary problem, and you might not encounter it at all," the man continued, "But, if you hear a buzzing noise, then you ought to push that button before the real trouble can start."

Bumblebee took that to mean that, if he attempted to actually communicate, he'd get zapped. The man had thought of everything... everything except the fact that his latest expensive gift to his kids wasn't just another _thing_ , but actually a thing alive. Bee was going to _feel_ it every time that button was pressed and, even though he'd just met them, he got the sense that these kids would be pressing it... possibly often. He'd never seen more immediately obviously irresponsible people in his life.

"I hope this isn't all we get for Christmas this year," Fina remarked, arms crossed again.

"Yeah, 'cause it's actually pretty lame," Rick added, "We already each have our own car. Why would we ever want to _share_ one? Especially a yellow one?"

"Oh, like silver's better," Fina challenged.

"Silver is flashy without being eye searing," Rick told her.

"Silver is boring," Fina retorted.

"And neon pink with green trim is ostentatious."

"It says I'm unique," Fina said.

"And mine says I have taste," before Fina could argue, Rick gestured to Bumblebee, "What does this one say?"

Fina became thoughtful and slowly walked around Bumblebee, evidently looking for just the right insult. Frankly, Bumblebee could understand and agree with both of them, if it wasn't for the fact they were so set on arguing with each other about it. Bee liked to think his model and color combination was the right mix of things to make him dramatic without necessarily being overly memorable. After all, to the people of Earth, he was supposed to be just another car, and he didn't want them looking too closely at him because otherwise they'd realize he had no driver. He liked the flash, but he also needed not to be noticed as anything more than a visually striking muscle car. Yellow and black did that. Then again, he was somewhat biased. Of course he liked his own appearance, he'd chosen it for himself.

"It says..." Fina answered after circling Bumblebee and then looking at him for a long time, "that the owner of this car wishes they were a race car driver, but either doesn't have the talent or lacks the nerve."

"Now _that_ , I actually agree with," Rick said, nodding.

"You realize you can repaint it, don't you?" their father asked, then added before either of them could answer him, "You'll thank me someday when being behind the wheel of this car saves your life."

"Oh I'm not getting behind the wheel of that thing," Rick told him.

"Fina?" their father questioned.

"Yeah, okay. I do have a party to go to tonight."

"Thank you," he turned to Rick, "Serafina is willing to at least try the car. What about you?"

"In what universe do you see me taking _that_ -" Rick gestured contemptuously towards Bumblebee, "-over the Jag?" he waved at the sleek silver car behind him.

"Fine, I won't make you drive it," was the defeated reply, "But at least think about it."

"Yeah, I'll do that. Around the same time as Fina stops cheating on her boyfriend."

"Rick!" Fina smacked his shoulder angrily, "It was one time, and Mark and I were both drunk."

"I don't want to be hearing this," their father said, "So I'm going to leave. You two... try not to kill each other before your mom gets up."

 _So much for parental guidance_ , Bee thought _._

"Ugh, that car is _so_ going to clash with my dress," Fina said, and crossed her arms one more time.

"Maybe if you weren't dressed like a giant cupcake, it wouldn't," Rick told her.

"You're just mad because Tracy didn't invite you."

"Because I broke up with her, remember?"

"Over a text. Yeah, I remember perfectly well," Fina responded.

 _Are most humans like this and I just never noticed?_ Bumblebee wondered.

While it was true he hadn't spent a great deal of time around humans outside of the small circle that knew Autobots existed, he felt very nearly certain that he'd have noticed if people were as petty and spiteful and angry and selfish as these two seemed to be upon first inspection.

For the first time since encountering MECH, he felt shaken in his faith in humanity. Though really it was faith in Optimus, who believed in the good humanity had to offer. But if this was what the average human looked like, maybe... well... maybe Optimus was wrong. Bee wasn't ready to wonder if humanity was worth saving, but it clearly wasn't as grand a race as Optimus and the rest of them had always believed. He knew it wasn't the goodness of humanity that mattered, that their relative worth wasn't why the Autobots were standing in the way of the Decepticons. But it was difficult to see why he'd want to risk his life for either of these people... or their father for that matter.

But, if it came to it, he knew he would do exactly that. It was what Autobots did. Defending the helpless and the powerless was what they did, and that was especially true of humans who were innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire of a cosmic battle between titans. If he started to pick and choose which of the defenseless he wanted to protect based on how much he liked them or what they could do for him, Bumblebee knew he wouldn't be any better than Megatron.

"I just wish it was a little less... overtly macho," Fina said, absently kicking Bee's front tire, "I mean, seriously, could this _be_ any more of a douchy guy car?" she turned to her brother, a sarcastically sweet smile on her face, "Absolutely the perfect car for you."

"Now isn't that sexist?" Rick inquired, his sarcastic tone equal to hers.

 _I really don't like either of you._ _ **Please**_ _just go away,_ Bee thought.

As if they had read his mind, they finally turned to go and take their fight back to the house. When the door closed behind them, Bumblebee sighed with relief. He dreaded the coming evening, fearing it would bring more of the same... or perhaps something even worse. He could think of little more miserable in the world than basically being forced to eavesdrop on two strangers fighting. If he had known what was coming next, he might not have been so quick to make that judgment.

* * *

When it got late, Optimus had insisted that Raf be taken back home. Raf had protested, but he didn't really have a valid argument. He wasn't really helping to find Bumblebee, not when they'd already exhausted all the logical means of finding him. Optimus didn't seem to believe him when Raf told the Autobot leader that his family probably wouldn't miss him if he was gone all night; they were busy with holiday preparations that didn't include him.

He was right.

Raf came home to a darkened house. Everyone had gone to bed already. Because his light was out, they'd assumed Raf had gone to bed early and they simply hadn't noticed. He crept through the dark living room, not sparing the Christmas tree in the corner a glance and avoiding looking at the stockings hung on the mantel. Then into the pitch blackness of the hall, and into his bedroom. The neighbor's Christmas lights were on a timer and had been put out for the night.

Raf hadn't found sleep easily, and he was up early the next morning, using his laptop to look for anything that might potentially be an Autobot sighting.

"C'mon, Bee. The camera loves you. Someone must have seen you... somewhere."

But, for once, no phone camera, no security camera and no traffic camera had seen anything that bore even a passing resemblance to the yellow and black Autobot Scout.

 _Some Christmas this will be. The one person who'd never forget me is nowhere to be found_.

It was selfish, and he felt instantly guilty, but Raf couldn't help but feel that way.

It seemed as if all traces of Bumblebee had been wiped from the face of the Earth.


	6. Love Hit a Wall

Either Rick been being senselessly mean (a real possibility), or his remark had made Fina change her mind about what she would wear that evening, because when she opened the garage and stepped inside, she was wearing a dark blue-green dress that would prove to be backless when she took off her fitted black jacket. The top half had lace which matched the rest of the dress, the long skirt billowed in the wind, revealing gold high heels. Carefully applied makeup, braided hair piled on her head and gold with diamond jewelry made Fina look much more mature than she had appeared that morning.

Fina slid behind the wheel gracefully, feeling light as a bird in the driver's seat, and set a shimmering black purse with gold shoulder strap in the space between the two seats; almost in the same motion producing a phone in a holly patterned case from within the purse.

She put in the key and Bumblebee obediently started his engine while she messed around with her phone, finally plugging it into a power port on the dash. The car was flooded with pop Christmas music as Fina placed her hands lightly on the steering wheel. She frowned as she shifted gears, letting go of the wheel with one hand to pick up the phone while driving out of the garage. One eye remained on the driveway, while the other slid to her phone and she changed the music to something that reverberated through Bee like thunder.

"That's bringin' the noise," Fina said, leaning back in her seat and accelerating up the hill to the street, a smile appearing on her face as the interior was filled with 'noise'.

Fina didn't pause at the end of the driveway to check for other cars or pedestrians, simply pulled out onto the street, asking for too much speed too soon, so that Bumblebee was jarred hitting the street, almost like he'd gone over a large speed bump. After the unsettling bump, Fina put a hand up to check and make sure her hair hadn't been disturbed, then she started to sing along with the raucous Christmas song as she blew through the stop sign at the end of the street and turned left without signaling.

Just about the only thing Bumblebee didn't object to was her taste in music.

He didn't like her refusal to let him signal a turn, the way she insisted upon exceeding the speed limit or her tendency to change lanes without checking the mirrors. But the only way to express his dissent was to slow down or stop. He couldn't turn on the signal without her asking it of him first, he couldn't turn when she hadn't told him to. And refusal would probably be more dangerous, especially for him since that was almost sure to get her pressing that stupid button in no time.

When she stopped in front of a house, Bumblebee thought it looked like a pretty dead party, since there were no cars and the house was quiet. Then she startled him by leaning on the horn. Only because of involuntary reflex did he respond immediately, it had taken him so by surprise. She blasted the horn a couple of times before a boy about her age came running out.

He went around the front of the car and got in the passenger seat.

"I heard you the first time. Did you really need to inform the people in Canada that you're picking me up for this party?" the boy demanded irritably, then he leaned toward her and she towards him.

They kissed, and it was clear he wanted to do more than that, but she pulled away and smiled coyly.

"Time for that later," Fina said, "My makeup is perfect and I don't want to redo it in the car when we get there."

Bumblebee sighed internally with relief. The last thing he wanted happening in his front seat was a couple of teenagers making out. He already felt quite embarrassed enough.

"Fine, but I'm holding you to that promise," the boy told her, flashing dazzling white teeth in a brief, slightly wicked smile, which Fina happily mirrored before shifting gears and pulling back onto the street.

She turned down the music slightly, and the momentary distraction would have caused her to weave into the wrong lane if Bumblebee had chosen to respond to the signal he got from the turn of the steering wheel. But neither human was paying any attention to him, so he ignored her and stayed on course.

"Where did you get this car?" the boy asked, "It's pretty bad-ass."

 _About time someone thought so,_ Bee thought, though he realized he was being egotistical for no reason.

"Dad. Early Christmas present," Fina said, sounding sour about it, "Rick and I are supposed to share it. Can you imagine? We each have our own car and he wants us to bother with this one? And share it while we're at it?" she scoffed, "The only reason I'm driving it is mine's still in the shop."

Running his hand along the soft faux leather on the inside of the passenger door, the boy smiled again, "Fina, if you and Rick don't want it, I'll sure take it. It's a lot nicer than my ride."

"Which is why we're taking mine and not yours," Fina replied coolly, "No offense, but a motorcycle is Hell on long hair like mine. I'd have to cement my hair into place if I wanted to look like anything other than a complete disaster."

"Can't you for once in your life think of something besides appearances?" the boy was suddenly angry sounding, and it was soon evident this was the precursor to a fight... one they'd had before, "My bike is practical and, more importantly, I have to pay for the gas myself."

"Ugh, not again. I get that my dad has more money than yours. Can we drop it? Besides, I'm sure it'll please you to know that this car is some sort of weird cutting edge tech or something and doesn't take gas."

"Well now I really want it," the boy said, but it was clear he felt sulky now.

"Eddy..." she sighed, forcing the tension that had built out of her shoulders, "Look, I'm sorry, okay? It's just... it's been kind of a bad week. I just don't want to fight right now."

"Coulda fooled me," Eddy muttered under his breath.

"I'm serious," Fina said, looking over at him instead of watching the road, "If you stop whining about how little money you make, I'll stop complaining about this stupid car."

"How 'bout we just forget the car?" Eddy said, a wolfish gleam coming into his eye, " _And_ the party?"

"I don't know about you, but I didn't dress like this for no reason. I want to be appreciated."

"Isn't my appreciation enough?" Eddy was sulking again.

Fina started to speak, stopped herself and instead smiled weakly, "Of course, but I have other friends, and Tracy's holiday bash is the biggest party of the year. I'm not missing this. And neither are you."

They were silent for the rest of the drive, and the music somehow couldn't fill the space between them. When they arrived at their destination, there were so many cars there already that they had to park along the edge of the street. Fina checked her makeup with a mirror from her purse and then they both got out, leaving the car unlocked. Bumblebee was glad to see them go, he'd had enough teen drama for one day.

He was also seriously cramping from having been in vehicle mode for so long. Cybertronians rarely stayed in vehicle mode for more than a few hours at a time, and their biological systems would start seriously complaining if they remained in vehicle form for more than twelve hours. Bumblebee had already far exceeded twenty four and his body was telling him about it. Still, he'd rather sit on the side of the road by himself with aches and pains than listen to one more teenager fight.

Anything was better than more of _that_.

The night was cold, and the houses and yards were covered in a layer of pristine white. The sky was clear after the snow of the morning, but the bright lights ensured that the stars were invisible to human eyes. Bee could see them however, and it seemed almost like they were closer than usual to him, even though he knew that was impossible. Somehow, their brilliance made him feel a little less alone, because he knew that the Autobots -his family- could see those same stars, that same moon above. If they were looking at the same moon he saw, they couldn't be as far away as it felt like.

* * *

As the evening wore on into night, the party got louder. Somebody turned the music up, and then people began talking more loudly to be heard until they were shouting loud enough to be heard from the street. Then someone turned the music up even more.

A couple hours after she went inside, Fina came out. She wasn't alone, but it wasn't Eddy with her. The boy she had in tow was taller than Eddy, and had blond hair. As they bumbled their way through the mass of parked cars, it became clear that they were both heavily intoxicated, and Bumblebee remembered what Rick had said earlier... and also what Fina's defense had been.

He wasn't all that sure what "cheating" meant in terms of boyfriends and girlfriends, primarily because he didn't fully understand the terminology. Raf had tried to explain it to him, and he'd listened to Jack explaining it to Arcee, but it had all been terribly confusing to him, and talking to Arcee afterward only deepened his confusion. Bulkhead's report on what Miko had told him only furthered the mystery. Bumblebee had the uncomfortable feeling that he was about to find out more than he wanted to know about human relations.

When Fina reached Bumblebee, she opened the door and slid easily into the backseat. The boy with her hesitated, looking over his shoulder at the party they'd just left.

"Mark, come on! Get in," Fina called, and Bumblebee knew his worst fears had just been confirmed.

Laughing self-consciously, Mark climbed into the back seat and shut the door behind him. Fina closed the gap between them and kissed him with far more enthusiasm than she had early kissed Eddy. One of Mark's hands went to the side of her face, then slid down her shoulder as she leaned into him.

Increasingly uncomfortable, Bumblebee contemplated yelling loudly to startle them. But the resultant buzzing noise would probably cause Fina to push the button her father had pointed out. He shivered just remembering what that felt like, but the heat being generated in the back made him so uncomfortable that he thought maybe it would actually be worth it if only he didn't see what this was leading up to. He suddenly didn't want to know any more about humans than he did already.

Mark's hands went around Fina's neck and reached back to unhook her dress, while her fingers were busily unbuttoned his shirt. Fortunately they both fumbled and became distracted by kissing one another. It seemed they were trying to occupy the same physical space as one another, though Bumblebee couldn't imagine how removing their clothes would help them do that. They slid back and forth across the back seat as they pressed against each other, then pulled apart and tried again to get out of their clothes.

Bumblebee was so busy being embarrassed and trying to neither see nor hear what was going on in his back seat that he didn't even notice Eddy until the door opened and the dark haired boy reached in to grab Mark by the back of his shirt collar. Eddy hauled Mark out of the car, swung him around and punched him in the face. Mark went down on the pavement and blood gushed from his nose.

"Eddy, no!" Fina screamed, holding up her unhooked dress with one hand while the other aided her in getting out of the car.

Mark got to his feet, took a swing at Eddy. Eddy ducked and hit Mark again, this time in the side. Mark collapsed sideways and landed against Bumblebee's hood. He rounded on Eddy again, and this time managed to connect, splitting the other boy's lip. The fight then degenerated into a wrestling match that brought them both to the ground, with Fina on top of them desperately trying to break it up. She was yelling and in tears, but the noise they generated drew no attention from the house.

Finally, Eddy hauled Mark to his feet, preparing to punch his lights out. Fina interceded, grabbing his free arm and holding.

"Eddy, stop! Stop! I brought Mark out here! Eddy, please!"

Eddy knocked her back with his elbow, but let Mark go. Mark slumped to the ground as Eddy turned on Fina, who pressed herself against Bumblebee in sudden fright.

"You what!?" Eddy exploded, "Fina, how could you!?"

"I-I didn't know what I was doing. Eddy, I-"

Eddy slapped her across the face and she was reduced to incoherent sobbing.

"Save it!" he snarled angrily, "Ricky warned me about you, but I didn't believe him. I thought it was just a part of that sibling feud you two have got going. I should have known. You _bitch_."

"Eddy," Fina pleaded through her tears, but he just glared until she fell silent.

"You go on home. I'll find another ride."

"But-"

"Go on!" he shouted in fury, "Get out of here! Take you bastard lover with you if you want! I don't even care! Just leave!" he looked like he wanted to hit her again, but instead he kicked Bee's tire.

Then he swung away and stalked back up the walk to where the party was. Fina looked at Mark, who was whimpering on the pavement. She looked irresolute, but then finally helped him get up. She half-carried him to the passenger side of the car and he slumped into the seat. She slammed the door on him and then hurried around to get into the driver's seat.

Still in tears, she gasped and tried to take a few deep breaths to calm herself. She leaned her forehead against the wheel, and Bumblebee felt her trembling, and her tears touched him when they fell. He couldn't feel sorry for her exactly. He understood that she had somehow betrayed Eddy, though he was uncertain how. Something in her quiet sobs spoke more of guilt than anything.

Mark lay slumped in his seat, his head leaning against the window, leaving blood on the glass.

As Fina regained her composure and put the key in the engine before shifting gears and leaving the party, Bumblebee felt he understood humans less than ever.


	7. A Victimless Crime

Bumblebee didn't know enough human biology to know if it was the tears or the inebriation that was causing the sharp dip in Fina's driving skills. Really he only knew a little about drunk drivers because he'd once inquired to Raf about some bad drivers he'd encountered on the road. Raf had explained that sometimes people did things that made them incompetent drivers, but they didn't realize that's what had happened to them. He'd said they were called 'drunk drivers'. Bumblebee had seen that tears clouded over the eyes of humans, and so he assumed it obscured their vision. He didn't know which was causing Fina to send him careening back and forth across the icy road, but he wished she'd stop.

Bumblebee himself couldn't put on the breaks, only cut power or fail to follow an instruction. But he was reluctant to do that for a couple of reasons, not the least of which being that menacing button.

In addition to that was the fact that he was in a bit of a gray area. Autobots were supposed to protect humans at all costs from Decepticon threats, but Optimus Prime had made it a rule that Autobots were not to interfere with humanity. They were not to interfere with the conflicts between countries, and they were not vigilantes out to capture criminals. But if Fina was driving him, wasn't he already sort of involved? If she got hurt while she drove him, wouldn't he be to blame? Wouldn't that be someone getting hurt because of a Cybertronian, something Bumblebee had sworn to prevent at any cost?

On the other hand, Fina was in control. Far as she was concerned, he was just another car. And he certainly owed her nothing. She was not his friend. Truth be told, he was disliking her more and more the longer he spent in her presence. Whatever happened to her would be her doing.

But, if Bumblebee hadn't been given to her, she would have had no vehicle. Her father had said he wouldn't let her drive the SUV, and Rick certainly wouldn't let her drive his car. If not for Bumblebee, Fina wouldn't even be driving at all. Not that he had chosen to be here, but he still couldn't help but feel like he was at least a little responsible.

Even aside from that, he already had blood on his hood from when Mark had fallen against him, and there was now blood on his window from Mark leaning his head against it. Bumblebee felt soiled by both stains. Not in a vain sort of way, but on a deeply personal level. He felt dirty and wrong with blood on him. He didn't want any more human blood on him, no matter what the reason for it was. That a human had bled on him was something which should never, ever have happened for any reason.

Still, what could he do without risking the button, and without revealing himself as a Cybertronian?

Between his conditioning of the day before and his preoccupation with his thoughts, Bumblebee blindly obeyed when Fina had him turn into the wrong lane. By the time he saw the oncoming headlights, it was too late for thought. Cutting power and coming to a rolling stop would do no good here and now, it would only delay the inevitable. It was one thing not to interfere with Fina, but it came to Bumblebee in a flash that she would not be the only person who might be hurt. He could not allow this collision to occur. But, no matter how he tried, he couldn't gain a bit of physical control. He couldn't turn without her telling him to. He did the only thing he could.

 _{Fina, stop! Look out!}_ he knew she wouldn't understand, but hopefully the unexpected noise he made would jar her out of the half-sleep she seemed to be falling into, _{Fina, turn the wheel!}_

"Hmm? What?" Fina roused, reaching for the button without seeming to think, but the motion was arrested as she realized her danger and screamed.

"Fina, turn the damned wheel!" Mark shouted at her, having opened his eyes when Bumblebee spoke.

He reached across and yanked so hard on the wheel that Fina was shoved into the button. Bumblebee's tires squealed on the asphalt, but he couldn't hear it through the electricity snapping in his processor. His vision flared bright white, and he only barely felt the cue to turn, despite the fact that his steering wheel had been wrenched as far to the right as it would go. His speed faltered and he heard the screech of metal on metal as his side scraped against that of the other vehicle.

After what seemed like an eternity, Fina managed to pull herself back from the dash and into her seat. She took the wheel from Mark and Bumblebee obediently wobbled unsteadily to the edge of the road.

Fina sat bolt upright, her back pressed hard against the seat, hands gripping the wheel tightly. Her braided hair had fallen messily around her face, her mascara had run and tears streamed down her face.

"Did I hurt anyone? Are they okay? Are they alive? Mark! Are they okay?" Fina asked the questions too quickly for Mark to have answered any of them, her voice rising with each word.

Using his side mirror, Bumblebee looked back across the road. The other car had slid to a stop on the opposite side of the road, facing the way they'd come. Frost seemed to dance in the lights of the car, and its tires had dug into a pile of snow along the edge of the road. The driver seemed as rattled as Fina, but they shortly got out and looked fine. Bumblebee didn't know if there were passengers.

Fear rolled through him as the driver hurriedly went to the back door of their sedan and opened it to reveal a child's car-seat. He felt another thrill of horror when he got the signal from Fina to shift gears and speed away down the road. He chose to ignore her, even though his insides were still shuddering from her hitting the button earlier. He would not leave, not until he knew he hadn't been responsible for getting anyone seriously hurt or possibly killed.

"Come on, stupid thing!" Fina practically screamed, slamming her hands against the wheel, "Why won't you go!?"

"Hey, Fina!" Mark interrupted, "You want to make this worse? If you bug out, you'll be one of those hit and run drivers. You're not supposed to just leave the scene of an accident."

"Mark, you don't understand!" Fina wailed, "I left my purse back at the party. It has my driver's license in it. And I've been drinking, I'm not legal! If the police get involved, I'm in real trouble here."

"Okay," Mark said, "Okay... well... we'll switch places then."

"Mark, you've had as much to drink as I have, and this isn't even your car."

"It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter," Mark told her hurriedly, "Just switch places. Hey, maybe they'll be willing to just exchange information and we can both leave."

"Mark, you're forgetting something," Fina told him.

"What? What am I forgetting?"

 _A lot_ , Bumblebee thought, _Mostly that those people over there could be hurt and you're doing nothing to help them or even see if they need any help. You're only thinking of yourselves!_

"This piece of shit car won't move!" Fina smacked the wheel again, "Even if that driver's willing to let bygones be bygones, what do we do then? I mean, who do we even call? You need to get to the hospital to get checked out... Mark, that's it! We just tell the truth! They can't hold it against me for trying to hurry my boyfriend to the hospital after another guy beat the crap out of him!"

 _You're so awful,_ Bumblebee thought miserably.

Fina shoved the loose hair out of her face, quickly wiped back her tears and opened the driver's side door. She got out and jogged across the street. She was too far away for Bumblebee to hear clearly, but he could see that she was apologizing and pleading with the other driver, who by this time had a child in their arms, having retrieved the baby from the seat. Bumblebee was relieved to see the child seemed to be unharmed, and that nobody else appeared to be in the car.

After Fina had been talking for a minute or two, she began to cry again. Seemingly reluctant but agreeable, the driver finally waved her off, putting their child back into the car-seat. They exchanged information with Fina, then got back into their seriously scraped vehicle and drove away.

Fina smiled crookedly when she got back in, then giggled with relief.

"I can't believe he actually believed me!" Fina laughed.

"It's true though... most of it," Mark reminded her, equal relief in his voice.

"I know, but it sounds like such... such an excuse!" Fina exclaimed, then sighed, "Now, if we could just get this stupid car to start..." she turned the key and Bee cooperatively fired up his engine.

There was no point in making them stay out here anymore, he'd already done all he could. He just hoped the near-tragedy which had just occurred would encourage Fina to be more alert and careful. He certainly didn't plan to follow any more cues to cross to the wrong side of the road.

He slipped into gear and started forward effortlessly, provoking a squeal of surprised and triumphant laughter from both Fina and Mark. Both had clearly believed Bee was more than just scraped and wouldn't start up on his own. He supposed maybe he should have done that to them, just to make them face the consequences of what they'd done. But the truth was he did want Mark to go to a hospital and get checked out. His breathing had sounded funny ever since Eddy hit him in the gut during their fight.

Mark wasn't exactly blameless, but the last thing Bumblebee wanted right now was for him to suffer and possibly die right here in Bee's shotgun seat. By doing what Fina asked now, Bumblebee could make sure the injured Mark would get the help he needed. He wasn't about to take his feelings out on a human, even if it was a human that had provoked his disgust in the first place.

He just hoped Fina wouldn't reconstruct the events and realize not all was as it seemed with her car...

* * *

Raf's family hadn't noticed he'd been gone the night before, nor did they make note of the fact he spent the whole day in his room with the door shut. Nobody came to ask him what he was doing, or if he wanted to join the family for cookie decorating. Nobody noticed that he didn't even try to get anyone's attention for anything that day. The only time anyone said anything was at breakfast and dinner, when his mother noted the empty chair and yelled for him to come and eat. He guessed the only reason she knew he was missing was that empty chair, or maybe doing a headcount. Otherwise, who would know he was gone? His family was simply too big for anyone to be keeping track of him.

Aside from those two interruptions, Raf didn't leave his laptop for a minute, looking on every possible website (as well as hacking into security cameras) for any sign of Bee. He began his search in the area where Bumblebee had disappeared, but eventually it went city-wide. Linking his laptop to the computer at the Autobot base, Raf worked with Ratchet to set up a scanning program to search for any vehicle matching Bumblebee's description.

It soon became apparent that Urbana 500s were extremely popular, and yellow with black was a common color choice. Raf had never realized how many of a type of car existed until he found himself looking through literally thousands of photos from security and traffic cams, along with pictures posted to social media. He'd also never realized how well disguised the Autobots truly were, as it took even Ratchet some time looking at many of the pictures to make sure they weren't Bumblebee. From a mere photo or short video clip, it was impossible to tell a vehicle mode transformer from a regular car unless they were doing something other than that which a normal car would do.

Well, _nearly_ impossible.

Raf and Ratchet spent a goodly number of hours between them at their respective locations refining the search to exclude visual features Bumblebee didn't have and to include ones that not every yellow/black Urbana 500 had.

Still, at the end of the day they were left with hundreds of photos, at least as many video clips and even more traffic footage that they hadn't even checked yet. Ratchet advised Raf to get some sleep, promising that he would continue working, but Raf chose to ignore him.

Bots didn't just disappear. Someone, somewhere had to have seen Bee. If it took him from now until Christmas, Raf was going to find the video clip or photo that would give him a clue where his friend had been taken. Bumblebee couldn't just be gone. Raf refused to believe it.

In the meantime, the other Autobots had gone looking for 'Cons, but they'd had little luck except for a lone vehicon scout. When Arcee pursued the vehicon, it tried to outrun her, which resulted in a loss of control turning on a cliff road. The vehicon had pitched off the side and met a definite end, leaving the Autobots no closer to finding Bee, or even proving the 'Cons had him (something Raf was beginning to doubt). But, if not the 'Cons, then who? And for what possible reason?

* * *

Bumblebee was parked sideways across two parking spaces in the lot outside the hospital. It was a source of deep irritation to him. He'd always been proud of his proficiency at hitting precisely the center of a marked parking space on the first try. With the exception of Arcee, the other Autobots had a hard time getting into parking spaces, even the large ones meant specifically for shipping vehicles like semi-trucks. Cliffjumper, when he'd been alive, was a especially miserable at it, mainly because he didn't care. And Bumblebee was the only one that dared attempt parallel parking. The 'Cons, of course, simply didn't care and were never seen parked anywhere.

Bee knew being splayed across two parking spaces shouldn't be bothering him right now... but it was, especially when other cars were forced to circle the lot looking for a place to put themselves. The holidays were a busy time of year for hospitals.

One person actually got out of their car and got out their keys. Seeing Bumblebee was dented and deeply scored on the left side, they walked around to the right and keyed the right side twice before getting back in and leaving.

 _Oh sure!_ Bumblebee fumed, _Punish the car for what the driver did! You think I wanted this!?_

He knew his irritation was just a distraction from the fact that he was tired, and a dull ache had spread throughout his systems as the result of being in vehicle mode for so long. Certain parts had also been shifted with the impact, and he couldn't straighten them out in vehicle mode. He felt metal pressing metal where it shouldn't, and knew damage would result in the long-term if he had to stay like this.

But he was also wondering how many more times he could survive that awful button... and how many more times he would be called upon to do so in the defense of people he was trying to be a good enough bot not to actively hate with each drop of energon in his body and every pulse of his spark.


	8. Everybody's Here, Except You

Bumblebee didn't know why, but Fina drove home alone, leaving Mark at the hospital. He hoped the boy wasn't seriously hurt, that maybe someone else was going to pick him up and take him home. But Fina didn't talk to herself about it, so Bee was left to his theorizing.

Halfway home, Fina pulled off the road, evidently because she couldn't see. She was in tears. Once she pulled off the side of the road, she leaned her head against the steering wheel and let herself sob. Much as Bee didn't like her, he was a bot of gentle and compassionate spirit, and her tears moved him. He wished there was something he could do to make her feel better.

But there wasn't anything he could do. Nothing except for sit there while the salty teardrops fell from her eyes and landed on him.

Then, for no discernible reason, she suddenly straightened up, screamed and smacked the wheel with her hand. Sitting back against the seat now, she continued to cry, occasionally pausing to scream again. Nobody outside the car would hear her, no matter how loud she screamed. He got the impression Fina didn't really want anyone to hear her. The truth was, he wasn't convinced she fully knew what she was doing.

Finally, she pressed herself against the seat, grabbed firm hold of the steering wheel with her arms rigid. She took several shuddering breaths, and blinked furiously until the tears cleared from her eyes. It seemed like she was going to get herself under control, then she choked and broke again.

"Why?" she spoke aloud, and for a moment Bee thought she was speaking to him, but it was soon clear she was asking herself, "How could this have happened to me!?" and then she asked the question Bee had been asking since he'd first met her, "When did I become this person?"

There was a pain in her eyes when she opened them again that pierced Bumblebee to the core. He didn't -couldn't- understand, not really. Or so he told himself. But the truth was that he had done things during the war, and there had been times when he'd become a someone he didn't even recognize. That was different though. That had been war. That had been survival. That had been defending his kind from extinction at Decepticon hands. It was different... but still he had felt the pain he saw here before. That pain only came when you woke up one day and realized you had become someone you didn't want to be. Somehow, without realizing it, you'd become someone you'd have called a monster, perhaps even swore you'd never be. That's the pain which was in Fina's eyes now.

Sniffling, Fina furrowed her brow and her eyes cleared. It was obvious she'd changed what she was thinking about, and now she looked over at the dash where the radio was... and the dreaded button. She frowned and Bee felt a flash of fear at the thought that she might press it out of pure curiosity. Mercifully, she didn't. Instead, she spoke again.

"You saved my life," she said, and this time she really was speaking to Bee while she shook her head wonderingly, "Daddy said I'd be grateful for you... I didn't... I didn't believe him. I don't know if you've got some kind of collision detector or AI or something... but I know I would have crashed head on... I might even be dead now. But you... you didn't let that happen."

Maybe it was just that she was still a little drunk. Maybe it was just the shock of the evening. But somehow, she had realized in an hour what her father hadn't in all the time he'd worked for MECH. She didn't even know Cybertronians existed. Yet, somehow, she knew that Bumblebee was alive.

"Oh God," she said, leaning against the seat and looking up, "how did I get here?"

Bumblebee sensed she wasn't being rhetorical, nor was she referring to her physical location. He wished he could give her an answer. But, even if she could have understood him, he didn't know her, and he had no idea what choices she had made or what had happened to her that brought her to this place in her life. He didn't even understand humans well enough to know what this place _was_.

Until she reacted, Bee didn't even realize he'd let out a sympathetic whirring sound.

"Did you just-" she didn't finish the question as headlights on the road told of a vehicle coming towards her, a vehicle she happened to recognize as it pulled off the road in front of Bee.

Rick got out of the silver Jag and jogged over to Fina's door. She rolled down the window. Rick's breath burst out in clouds of frost as he spoke.

"Fina! Where the hell have you been? When you didn't answer you phone, Mom and Dad got worried. I've been driving around for over an hour. Tracy said you left the party, but Eddy was still there and-"

"Rick. Rick... Ricky, take a breath. I'm fine," Fina said, pausing to sniff, "I just... left my purse at the party when I drove Mark to the hospital, and my phone was in my purse, so-"

"Wait? Hospital? Mark? Fina, what happened? Did you sleep with him again?"

Fina scowled at him, hiding her pain behind anger, "Not that it's any of your business, but no, no I didn't. Eddy found out. They got into a fight, and Mark came out with the worst of it... and..."

"Fina, this is _stupid_. If you wanted to be with Mark, you should have just told Eddy. It was never weird that I was dating Mark's sister, and now Tracy and I are broken up, there's no reason you two can't-"

"Ricky, I don't want to talk about this right now," Fina interrupted sharply, "I just want to be left alone, alright?" the wavering of her voice told Bee that was the opposite of what she wanted.

Rick looked worried still, but not because he doubted what she said.

"You sober?" he inquired.

"Yes," Fina said, but her answer was unconvincing.

Rick sighed wearily, "Slide over. I'll drive you home and have dad come back with me to get the Jag."

"Rick, you don't have to-"

"I said slide over," Rick insisted sharply, opening the driver's side door, "Now do I need to push you or are you gonna move over by yourself?"

Fina reluctantly did as she was told, but she was clearly sulky about it. Rick himself didn't look too thrilled about leaving his precious Jaguar parked along the side of the road. Rick clearly noticed the dents and scratches Bee had sustained, but didn't ask.

The silence between them as Rick drove Fina home was thick enough to cut. But it wasn't long before Fina dozed off, evidently having exhausted her range of emotions for the night. It was probably a good thing Rick was driving. Though he went too fast and blew past stop signs like they were nothing, at the very least he was conscious and sober, which was more than could be said for Fina.

Rick called his dad on the drive home, and the man was waiting in the driveway with a red haired woman (probably his wife) when they arrived. Fina got out and the woman immediately took her into the house, while Rick's dad got into the passenger seat Fina had just vacated.

"Do you know what happened?" he asked of Rick, "It looks like she was in an accident."

"In case you haven't noticed, Fina and I don't talk much, and she wasn't exactly in a sharing mood," Rick replied shortly as he backed out of the driveway and turned back the way he'd come.

During the drive to the Jaguar, Rick's father tried to engage him in conversation a few times, but Rick was having none of it. When they got to where the silver Jag was parked, Rick practically leaped out of his seat and into the cold night. He got in the Jag and swiftly drove away. Rick's father remained in the passenger seat even once the boy and his car were out of sight.

"I suppose asking you what happened is out of the question."

 _{You wouldn't understand if I told you,}_ Bumblebee replied coldly.

"I didn't think so," the man sighed, "Looking at that scrape, I imagine I should be grateful she was driving you instead of that flimsy convertible of hers. I don't even want to _see_ the other car."

He got out and walked to the driver's side and got back in, but still didn't start the engine.

"You see now why I worry about my kids having the safest possible vehicle to drive."

Bumblebee said nothing to that. Sure, he saw. But he also saw that the real problem wasn't the safeness of the automobile, but the recklessness and carelessness of its driver. No matter how sturdy he might be, Bumblebee couldn't do anything to protect Fina from herself. She was a teenager and, as Bumblebee understood humans, her parents were supposed to be teaching her to make good choices, and protecting her, even when she didn't like it. Clearly, there was none of that happening here. Bumblebee didn't know anything about parenting, but he felt like knowingly allowing the girl to get drunk, drive dangerously and commit acts which made others humans so mad that they slapped her and beat each other up over it wasn't a good example of it.

"I feel like you're silently judging me," the man said.

 _Give the man a prize._

"You've got no right doing that," he said, turning the key and activating Bee's engine, "You're just a car now, and you have no idea what's going on with my family or my life."

 _It's not my judgment you're worried about,_ Bee thought, _You're judging yourself, and you don't even realize it. You know this isn't right, and taking me prisoner wasn't the only huge mistake you made recently. But sure, blame it on me. Clearly it's the car's fault that the people are stupid._

As he was being driven back to the garage, Bumblebee allowed himself to think of Raf for the first time since his abduction. It had been Rafael who'd taught Bee how wonderful humans really were. Before, protecting humanity had been just a directive, something he had to do because it was the order of a Prime. Not just _a_ Prime, either, but the last of the Primes, his leader. But then he'd met Raf by accident, and everything had changed almost in an instant. The boy had understood him, had trusted him implicitly from the first moment they met, had known that Bee wasn't there to hurt him, that he need never fear the Autobot Scout, no matter how big, how powerful and how strange Bumblebee seemed to the boy.

Bumblebee considered the other Autobots his family, but the friendships that had developed between them were borne of necessity. They worked together because they had to, played together because there was no alternative, spent time together because they were the last of their kind to share the same ideals. But Raf was different. He and Bumblebee didn't have to be friends. Heck, nothing said the kids had to ever visit the base for any reason. But they could, and they did. Raf especially.

Raf had become Bee's friend not because he had to, but because it was what he wanted. Bumblebee was closer to Raf than anyone else, human or Autobot. He loved that kid, and that love extended to include the rest of humanity. It wavered now because everything he loved about humanity was totally absent from these people. They were cruel to one another, thoughtless and mean-spirited, antagonistic and careless. They were the humanity that Raf seemed to know best from what the boy had said. How could the boy have any love left for the human race if this was what he saw of it?

The ache Bumblebee felt inside now wasn't from having been in vehicle mode for too long. He missed Raf very much, and he wondered if the boy missed him too.

* * *

Raf couldn't sleep when he went to bed that night.

He knew he shouldn't worry. Bumblebee had survived much in his time. He was strong and brave and resourceful and... and he was Raf's best friend, who sometimes needed help. Bumblebee wasn't invincible, and Raf knew better than anyone that beneath the warrior's exterior there beat a spark that was soft and gentle and loving and easily hurt. Even Autobots needed help sometimes, and Raf felt that -where Bumblebee was concerned- this was one of those times.

Raf just hoped that, wherever he was and whatever was happening to him, Bumblebee knew that his family was thinking of him, that they were worried about him and that they would do whatever it took to get him back home in time for Christmas (even if he didn't know what Christmas was).

It just wouldn't be Christmas unless and until Raf knew that his best friend was safe. He'd been wishing for so many things before Bee had gone missing, but now this was all he wanted in the whole world.


	9. The World is So Wrong

Bumblebee felt battered, tired and at a loss as to what to do. He was also beyond bored. Patrolling empty desert roads was a thrill a minute compared with sitting in a dark garage for hours and hours, hoping against hope that someone would need to go somewhere soon just to give him a break from the boredom. On the other hand, he wasn't sure he could handle another drive like that last one.

He knew that it was luck more than anything that had kept anyone from being seriously injured, that a scrape along his side was a small price to pay for nearly having been part of a head-on collision. Four humans could have very easily lost their lives. Bumblebee himself might have wound up seriously hurt, but that was only a vague possibility, whereas the death of four people was a virtual certainty.

And that, of course, had come after the horror of being driven by a reckless driver, being a lot closer to an aspect of humanity that he'd never wanted to see and witnessing a bunch of people hurt each other for no apparent reason. And that was even after listening to two siblings - _family_ \- argue like they wanted to kill each other and the only thing stopping them was their inept father, who was just as selfish and shallow as they were beneath the all-too thin veneer of maturity.

It was not lost on Bumblebee that all of this had been caused by that mysterious Earth holiday known as 'Christmas'. He'd been given as a Christmas gift, and that party had been a holiday party. If all this was what Christmas meant and looked like, then he didn't want to know more. He just wanted to go home, to go back to believing the best about humanity. He didn't like this place, and he didn't like these people, and he didn't like the things that had happened since he'd been brought here.

If this was Christmas, he wanted no part of it.

Though it had been very late when Bumblebee was parked in the garage the night before, it was still dark the next morning when Fina entered through the side door with a blue, plastic bucket of soapy water and a cleaning rag that had -at one time or another- been white.

She opened the passenger side door and sat sideways in the seat, dipping the cloth in the bucket and then setting to work on the black spots of dried blood on the window. It was clearly work she wasn't used to doing, and her technique left much to be desired. She was too cautious and gentle to do much to get the window clean, but Bumblebee rapidly began to suspect that wasn't why she was here anyway.

Fina's eyes were still red, presumably from all the crying she'd done the night before, and she seemed very tense as she worked. Her expression suggested she was concentrating very hard on not thinking about something, and the work was helping her do that. Bumblebee mostly hoped she wouldn't stop with the window, as there was some blood on the inside of the door and even a bit on the steering wheel from when Mark had grabbed it. Of course, it would also be nice to pound out the dents in his side and get rid of that scratch from the keying he'd taken, but soapy water and a wet rag wasn't going to do anything about that.

"Dad says I was imagining things last night," Fina said after she'd been working several minutes, "Ricky says I was so drunk I probably would have seen pink elephants if I was a normal person," here she paused and made a face which was evidently meant to represent what she thought of her brother.

Making the face seemed to remind her that she had a hangover, because she suddenly winced and closed her eyes briefly. Bumblebee had noticed that she'd only turned on the light near the door, and she was mostly able to see because of Bumblebee's own interior lighting.

After she recovered, Fina continued, "I know that's not true though. I know you did _something_ last night. It's a little fuzzy, but I know you're not just another car."

She resumed cleaning the window, and Bumblebee began to think he understood why she was out here doing this, when she could probably have just taken him to a car wash or something. She wasn't just removing the blood to avoid questions, but to have an excuse to be out here, talking to Bee. She didn't want to just come out and do that, either because of what her family might say or because she was afraid that she really had been mistaken and Bumblebee wasn't really alive as she was beginning to think. The window cleaning was just an excuse so she could pretend she wasn't here to have confirmed what she believed had happened the night before, whatever that was.

Bumblebee wasn't sure why he didn't respond to her. In a way, it was because he didn't want to be hurt again. He remembered only too well what it felt like, and how quick and almost automatic Fina's reaching for the button when he spoke to her had been. He didn't want that at all. But it wasn't just that, either. He still felt himself a captive, and it was practically a part of his core programming to maintain his silence when questioned by the enemy. His experience at the hands of Megatron when he'd lost his voice had taught him the price of silence, and the wall he'd built inside to keep the information he had safe from Megatron's hands was not easily torn down... not even now, after so much time had passed.

It was something he'd thought he was over, that he'd put it in the past. But when he'd gone into Megatron's very mind and found himself faced by the dark lord himself, Bee was silenced and paralyzed with fear. Even when he knew Megatron could not hurt him, still he had flinched. Though Megatron could not touch him, still he had not tried to run. When Megatron had asked questions of him, he had not answered, even though the sharing of information would have done no harm, and his silence had -perhaps- done more harm than would have been done if he had answered.

He had not realized until that moment how powerful the block he'd erected to protect himself really was. He'd broken it down almost too late, and the events that had followed made a part of him wish he hadn't even though he knew that breaking his silence was not what had very nearly cost him his mind and body. Those memories now hung him up, made him reluctant to speak, even though Fina was in no way connected to them and he had little reason to fear her.

"It's not just what you did," Fina said as she continued rubbing the cloth on the bloodstained window, "I felt it when I came into the garage last night, and again this morning. I can feel when the house is empty. Most people can. But, ever since you got here, I come out here... and I know I'm not alone. I feel someone is watching me... but I don't feel afraid. I didn't think about what it meant at first, but I had time to think last night because I couldn't sleep... and... well I was kind of avoiding thinking about some other stuff. So I just replayed what happened in my head and... you were trying to be subtle, but you were there all along. You kept me safe, even though you didn't want me to know it was you."

She paused to brush unruly strands of hair out of her face. It was obvious she hadn't brushed her hair since the night before, though the ties that held the braids in place were gone now. She'd at least washed off the mascara at some point, so she looked human again. It seemed like she wasn't prepared to cry again, though she was probably just one negative thought from it.

Fina didn't say anything else as she finished working on the window and moved on to the door. Though he wouldn't have expected it, Bumblebee felt his spirits lifted a little. He wasn't sure if it was having someone care for him, or just the fact that the blood on him had been bothering him more than he realized. Either way, he felt a knot of anxious tension untie itself and he relaxed just a fraction.

When she finished with the door, she rotated in her seat and leaned back to rest. The Fina of this morning was nothing like the one Bee had seen when he first met her, or the one that had gone to the party. This was the Fina at the end of the night, lonely and sad and scared to let anyone see.

Bumblebee knew a little about that. He had a tendency to try and do everything himself, and he didn't like anyone to see him when he was weak. He didn't want to be a burden on them, but also some irrational part of him was afraid of what others might think of him if he wasn't strong all the time. He knew a lot about hiding who you were, even from the people you cared about. And he also happened to know a little boy who was more at home among giant robots from another planet than he was in his own home with his own family. Raf wasn't a great deal like Fina otherwise, he wasn't anywhere near as angry or bitter as she was, nor as selfish. But Bee was beginning to suspect that the reason she was always looking out for herself was because she believed no one else would.

That in mind, the smallest act of kindness on Bumblebee's part must have just about shattered her whole world view. He wondered what sort of bot he'd be if no one had ever looked out for him, if no one had ever cared enough to come for him when he was in trouble, or to admit he meant more than just an extra set of blasters to them. He also wondered if Fina had seen the relief on Rick's face when he found her parked by the side of the road the night before. Did she know her family cared what happened to her? Or did she see them looking for her as just trying to control her and make her do what they wanted? Sometimes caring and controlling could look pretty similar.

"I tried sending Eddy a message, but he didn't answer. I know he was online, but I guess he was ignoring me. Tracy was mad enough to shoot me a nasty message. I guess she and I probably aren't friends anymore, just like her and Ricky are no longer on speaking terms."

Bumblebee recognized the tone of voice and he realized that Fina was confiding him, just as Raf did regularly. He wasn't entirely comfortable being confided in when he and Fina were perfect strangers to one another, but he also got the sense that she didn't really have anyone else and that was why she was picking a car she suspected of... what, exactly?.. to confide in.

"I guess maybe you wouldn't know anything about stuff like that," Fina said, leaning back against the headrest of the passenger side seat, "I mean... do cars even have friends and family?" she didn't seem to expect an answer, "For sure you couldn't possibly understand being with a really nice guy, but knowing this other guy who's just... so _hot_ , but you can't be with him because that would be totally weird because your brother is dating his sister, but then when you get drunk it just doesn't seem to matter anymore and he's hotter than ever and even though Eddy's a really nice guy, he's just not my type and Mark... Mark so _is_ my type, but I know I could never trust him because he slept with his friend's girlfriend and I know for sure he'd cheat on me even if we were together. I mean, I cheated on Eddy, but I don't want Mark to do that to me and knowing that makes me feel really guilty about Eddy, even though I only ever slipped when I had too much to drink and Mark was just right there and _so_ willing."

Bumblebee followed almost exactly none of that, but realized that somehow what she'd been going to do with Mark the night before had upset a whole bunch of people, seemingly including her, which really didn't make any sense because she'd been the one who initiated it... whatever it was. Not that Mark was blameless, assuming what they were doing was wrong (as it seemed to be), he'd certainly been agreeable to the whole thing. It seemed like Eddy should be the only wounded party, but Mark had come out with a bloody nose and cracked ribs, and Fina was an emotional wreak.

Bumblebee knew he would never understand humans.

"And, even though it's really stupid," Fina went on brokenly, "I keep thinking how glad I am that Eddy stopped us before we..." she trailed off like Bee was supposed to know, "In your backseat."

 _You already nearly drove me into another vehicle, and your friend bled all over my seats, I don't think whatever you were going to do would actually have been worse for me,_ Bee thought.

Suddenly Fina looked over at the button on the dash, and Bumblebee cringed inwardly. She looked thoughtful and reached her hand towards it. Bumblebee couldn't help it. He broke his silence at last.

 _{DON'T!}_

Startled by the sudden, loud buzzing, Fina arrested the movement of her hand, her eyes widening.

"I knew it," she breathed, "I knew it, but I didn't really know it. You _are_ alive," her eyes filled with wonder as she looked around at him, "You're alive... and that button hurt you. I heard you scream. I didn't even know cars _could_ scream until last night," her face darkened with a new understanding, "But Daddy knows. He knew I would hurt you. He knows... and he's letting it happen anyway."


	10. House is Not a Home

"What are you? How did my dad get you? Why did you try to protect me? Where are you from? Who built you?" Fina asked all of the questions one right after the other, and Bee couldn't answer any of them because she wouldn't know what he was saying.

When he remained silent, Fina banged on the dash (though not as hard as she might have), "Hey, I already know, so stop pretending you're not real and give me some straight answers."

 _{I can't!}_ Bumblebee exclaimed irritably, _{I could say anything and you wouldn't understand a word of it. I'm an Autobot, your dad kidnapped me off the street, see first answer, Cybertron and I wish humans would stop asking that last question because it's insulting.}_

"Hey, whoa, don't get mad. Do you have some kind of translator or something?" she leaned over and looked more closely at the radio, but saw only the usual buttons.

 _{No, I don't.}_

"Okay, okay, just calm down," Fina said, "Geez, I finally get you talking and you sound like an angry wasp."

 _{Bee,}_ Bumblebee corrected automatically, _{And I'm not angry. Just frustrated. You have no idea.}_

"Well at least that sounded a little calmer. Are you calm?"

 _{WHY would I be calm?!}_ Bumblebee snapped.

"Hey, I'm just trying to have a conversation here. You don't have to get all annoyed about it," Fina said, "You know, as expressive as you are, you'd think you'd be able to talk."

 _{You'd think...}_ Bumblebee grumbled.

It was then that he remembered one brief time when he'd been trying to communicate with Jack. What was it he'd said, one honk for good news and two for bad? Something like that. He supposed maybe he could try a variant of that, but a honk in this garage would be a little loud.

"Okay, let's slow this down a bit," apparently Fina had had a similar thought, "I am right in thinking that button hurts you, yeah?"

Bumblebee, thinking quickly, issued two quick burrs as emphatically as he could.

"Is that a yes or a no?" Fina inquired, "On TV, it's usually one for yes and two for no."

Bumblebee hurriedly changed his answer, hoping she wouldn't mistake it for an answer to her other question, which was not of the 'yes or no' variety.

"Yes? One for yes," she said, and Bumblebee repeated the single buzz, "And my dad knows, doesn't he?" another single buzz, "And he's okay with that?" Bumblebee kind of thought so, but he wasn't really sure because the man had gone to some lengths to make sure Bumblebee wouldn't get repeatedly shocked, so he remained silent on the issue.

"Come on, it's not like it's not obvious. My dad and I aren't on the best of terms anyway, admitting he hurt you on purpose isn't really going to lower my opinion of him. I just can't believe he would ask _me_ to do it without telling me. I mean, the only reason to hit it when you do your wasp noise is to keep you from talking to me. To hide what you are. From _me_ ," Fina sounded like she was about to cry or scream or something, but instead she just took a deep breath to calm herself.

 _{Yes, that's true. But he brought me here because he wanted to protect you. I don't understand much about humans, but I do understand this. He wants you safe, Fina. That's why he did this.}_

Fina shook her head, "You sure talk a lot when you're not saying anything."

 _{You're infuriating,}_ Bumblebee said dryly.

"If we keep playing twenty questions, we'll be here until Christmas," Fina said, "Maybe longer. So I'll just ask the few really important ones. Were you really trying to protect me last night?" a single buzz, "I'll skip asking why because that would take too long. The other one I've got is this: do you want to be here?" when Bumblebee hesitated to answer, she rephrased, "I don't know if you're a government experiment or an alien or a ghost possessing a car or what, but you came from somewhere, right?" one buzz as confirmation, "So are you here against your will? Is that what the button is for, to keep you here and make you do whatever you're told?" Bumblebee still didn't answer.

He wasn't sure why, but he was reluctant to share that information, even though the answer was obviously a resounding YES! He didn't know what, if anything, Fina would do with that knowledge. She was vulnerable, hurting and alone even in the midst of her family. He didn't want to make her feel unwanted by saying he'd rather be literally anywhere on Earth but here. It struck him as almost funny how deeply he could care when he didn't even like this person.

"Fine, don't tell me," Fina sounded both annoyed and hurt now, "It's not like I'm the only person you can talk to," her eyes flashed as she said acidly, "Oh wait, that's _exactly_ what I am. And, if you don't answer me, I'm going to go back in the house where it's actually warm and leave you here in the dark by yourself."

Sighing, Bumblebee did the only thing that seemed to make sense. He buzzed three times.

"Well that's real helpful," Fina told him, "But I guess I'll take what I can get."

 _{What are_ you _complaining about? I'm the one so far from home it's not even worth talking about.}_

As he said this, he finally understood something. That mansion on the hill might be where her family lived, the colored lights might be seasonally appropriate and maybe she had everything she'd ever wanted inside, but this place wasn't home to Fina, it was just a place to live.

If there was one thing Bumblebee understood, it was not having a home. When he had first come to Earth, Bumblebee had felt an ache inside that he didn't understand initially. It wasn't just that he was far from what had been his home on Cybertron, but far from the planet itself. And then that ache deepened as he realized his planet was dead. He would probably never see it again, and it certainly wouldn't be the home he'd left. Not only was he millions of miles away, but his home simply didn't exist. He could never, _ever_ return to the place he'd left, the home he loved and would have given his life for. Much as he'd learned to love Earth, it just wasn't the same. It wasn't his home. He didn't have a home. Not anymore.

He didn't really know when that had changed, he supposed after he met Raf. Somehow, home for him was wherever the boy was. He was Raf's appointed guardian, but also his friend. He understood on some level that Fina didn't have anyone like that, even though she had parents, a brother, friends, a boyfriend and presumably all the normal human relations. She had so many people in her life, but she didn't have anything like what Bumblebee had with the other Autobots or Raf.

He wondered if she had become a terrible person because of the relationships she didn't have in her life, or if she didn't have those relationships because she was a terrible person.

Rather than ask another question, Fina climbed out and shut the door behind her, being careful not to slam it. She pulled her phone from her pocket, stood back as she aimed it at Bee and took a picture over his objections.

"I'm gonna pass this around, okay? Maybe somebody I know has some idea what you are and where you came from. I need answers, and this yes or no question thing isn't working for me," Bumblebee buzzed urgent protests, but she either didn't understand or was ignoring him, "Look, I'll be back after breakfast. Dad has a mechanic that can fix key scratches and minor dents easy."

Bumblebee objected to that idea too. One thing he did _not_ need was a mechanic looking him over. One glance would be enough to prove to an expert that he was no ordinary car. It was one thing to have his picture taken, Raf was good at catching those and getting rid of them before too many people saw, but a mechanic would see instantly something was amiss, and it would get around pretty fast that there was something very strange about him. And that would be bad for the Autobots trying to keep a low profile. They were supposed to be secret, and taking one of them to a mechanic would blow it wide open.

"I'm gonna find out about you whether you like it or not," Fina's voice came from near the garage door, just before she turned out the lights and left Bumblebee in the dark.

* * *

Raf didn't know what to do when he got up the next morning. All his ability with tech, and he couldn't find a trace of Bumblebee. With all Bee had done for him, it seemed like Raf ought to be able to accomplish this one thing. How hard could it be to find a Cybertronian on Earth? Obviously the question was a stupid one. If a Cybertronian didn't want to be noticed on Earth, he wouldn't be. Presumably they were equally adept at keeping their prisoners secret as well.

After telling his mother he was going over to a friend's house, Raf convinced Ratchet to 'bridge him to the base. He just couldn't stand all the Christmas décor in the house, the music, the smells and everything when he knew that his best friend was somewhere out there alone, lost, scared, maybe even hurt.

At least at the Autobot base he didn't feel like he was participating in a celebration. It was strange, just a few days ago he'd have given anything to feel like he was a part of Christmas, and now he couldn't get far enough away from it.

No sooner had Raf settled in on the catwalk with his laptop then Bulkhead drove in and was met by Arcee.

"Any luck?" she asked, having just returned herself.

"Finally got hold of a 'Con and squeezed until I got something," Bulkhead said, but he shook his head miserably, "But not somethin' I wanted to hear."

"Tell me," Arcee demanded, her voice tinged with almost as much fear as ferocity.

"Vehicon said the 'Cons don't have him."

"You believe that?" Arcee asked, though it sounded like she already knew the answer.

"Since when have they ever lied when they had one of us in their claws?"

"Since never," Arcee answered with a sigh, "They're always so pleased with themselves they can barely contain their glee. Besides, it's not like Bee's got any intel to share, so they'd be using him as a hostage. A hostage isn't any good if we don't know they have him."

"We proved hostages are no good a long time ago," Bulkhead reminded her soberly, "Not only can't we trust them to keep their word, it's not worth the price we'd wind up paying."

Raf felt certain that Bumblebee's life was worth any price. But he also knew what Bee would have to say about that. Bee would rather die than see harm come Earth, humanity or his fellow Autobots. Whether he did so in battle or as a prisoner of the Decepticons wouldn't make any difference to him.

Besides, Bumblebee had once explained to Raf that, if the Decepticons found an advantage in taking hostages once, they would only do it again. And again. And again, until finally they'd gotten everything they wanted. To protect future potential hostages from being used in exchanges, and especially to protect them from being tortured or killed if and when the Decepticons went back on their end of the deal, some Autobots had made the ultimate sacrifice. Those bots had died, so that their brothers wouldn't have to. Even if they'd had nothing else to recommend them over Decepticons, the absolute loyalty of Autobots to their allies was sufficient reason to choose their side.

All that being true, if the Decepticons didn't have Bumblebee, then who did?

* * *

When the garage door opened a few hours later, Bumblebee expected to see Fina. He was surprised when it was Rick who stood behind the door as it rolled itself up. Rick walked over to Bumblebee, opened the driver's side door and slid into the seat.

"Alright, you piece of junk car, we're going for a drive. And we're not coming back."

Bumblebee didn't know where Rick wanted to go, or what he intended to do when he got there, but he didn't dare fight him. He could hear in the pitch of Rick's voice, and feel the way his hands gripped the wheel that he was angry. People did foolish, hurtful things when they were angry. Let alone, Bumblebee would have preferred to be nowhere near Rick when that anger finally burst forth in whatever form it was going to take. But he didn't want that anger to become directed at him.

Somewhat surprisingly, Rick didn't turn on the radio or plug in his phone so it could play music. He just hit the accelerator, realized he hadn't shifted gears yet, shifted into drive and then tried again. Bumblebee started forward, but caught sight of Fina running down the stairs from the mansion. She was barefoot and not dressed for the cold, and was clearly frantic to reach them.

Bumblebee let his tires slip on the icy concrete outside of the garage and failed to speed up at Rick's behest. If he had not, then Rick would have hit Fina for sure. Either she expected Bee to protect her again, or else she simply didn't care, because she darted out in front of the car and stood until Rick slammed the brakes, then she scrambled around to the driver's side and yanked it open.

"Ricky, you can't take him! You don't know what you're doing!"

"Fina, let go of the door!" Rick shouted back, trying to yank the door but unable to wrench it away from Fina, "I don't know why, but you've got some crazy ideas about this car. I'm gonna get rid of it before you completely embarrass yourself by letting the whole damned school know."

"You liar! You're not doing this for me, you're doing it because you can't stand that I've found something that matters to me when _nothing_ matters to you at all!" she tried to pry the door open more, but Rick wasn't about to let her do that and held fast.

"Fina, look at yourself! This is just a car, it's not worth it!"

"Just let me have this! You ruin everything!"

"Hey, I didn't make you sleep with Mark," Rick snarled, " _You_ did that for yourself."

"But you told Eddy, didn't you!?" Fina yelled back.

"So what if I did! He didn't believe me anyway!" they both froze and their eyes met, clearly in disbelief about what they were doing. Then they started wrestling for the door again.

"Let go!"

"You let go!"

"Stop it!"

"You stop it!"

In the end, Rick was stronger than Fina. He ripped the door from her hands, slammed it and hit the accelerator. Bumblebee wanted to ignore him, but he knew an electric jolt would blind and deafen him. On the slanted concrete driveway, it would be too easy for him to backslide or something and maybe hurt Fina, or even Rick if he crashed into the supports for the garage. Swallowing his pride, Bee obeyed Rick's idiotic directions and accelerated up the drive and out onto the street.

In his mirror, he saw Fina pursue, then give up. She stood helplessly in the driveway as Rick directed Bumblebee to go faster than was safe down the street, leaving her behind.

Rick's phone rang a few minutes later. It was Fina. He ignored her and turned off the ringer on his phone before tossing it face-down on the passenger's seat.


	11. Cars Go Runnin'

Bumblebee wished he understood humans better. He knew there was a lot he was missing, things not being said, feelings that didn't find their source in any of the stuff he knew about, but he couldn't sort it out. He didn't know enough about humans to guess. He just knew all these people seemed to feel betrayed and angry and guilty and lost and alone and he couldn't figure out why.

These people had a place they could call home, people they could call family, and an entire planet under them which was neither dead nor dying. And yet... somehow, they were the most miserably unhappy people Bumblebee had ever encountered. It was like they hated the very idea of being happy and were doing everything they could to make sure neither they nor anyone around them had a chance of having that. But he knew that couldn't possibly be true, so he must be missing something here. And, for reasons no logic could explain, he cared.

The drive wasn't a long one, but they had still left the city behind by the time they got where Rick was taking them. They turned onto a road with a sign saying it was under construction. Traffic cones, formerly lined across the road, had been set aside, and a couple of guys sat near them. They waved Rick through, and would probably put the cones back when everybody invited arrived.

Bumblebee was surprised to find that he _did_ understand what was going on here. This wasn't the first time Bumblebee had seen a street race. In fact, he'd participated in them before, though never against his will, and never when he couldn't take control of the driving if things got out of hand.

Not far from the cones, but out of sight of the main road they'd left, there were gathered a bunch of expensive cars. Rick parked Bee near them, cut the engine and got out. He didn't go far, but climbed onto Bee's hood, as all of the other drivers who'd gotten there early had.

"Hey, Rick!" called one of the drivers, "Where'd you get that one?"

"Dad gave it to me," Rick answered.

"What about the Jag?"

"You think I'd risk the Jag in a race like this? Get real!"

"I hear that," the driver responded, patting the hood of the car under him, "I 'borrowed' this one from my brother. He's got two more just like it."

"Gotta feel for the guys using their own cars," Rick said.

"Yeah, but that ain't gonna stop me from effing them up."

"Hey, if we wanted to play nice, we'd be on a racing strip, right?"

"Exactly."

Bumblebee didn't like the sound of any of that. He knew the rules of street racing could vary, but this sounded more like it was going to be a demolition derby than a race. Bee was a lot sturdier than any of the other cars here by virtue of being a Cybertronian, but he still didn't especially want to test his mettle (or his metal!) against a bunch of teenagers working out their emotional problems by trying to kill each other in an illegal street race. He loved to race, but he knew instinctively that this wasn't about racing, this was about breaking expensive things... for what? To make a point? What kind of point could possibly be made by smashing other people's cars up? Or even smashing your own?

Less than thirty minutes later, all the other drivers had showed up. Bumblebee noticed they all seemed to be about the same age, a bunch of teenagers who'd organized this, probably via the internet. No way were they all from the same school, especially not if you factored in the sheer size of the audience.

At the command of a girl carrying a bullhorn, the drivers got into their vehicles and maneuvered into place behind the makeshift starting line. The girl explained the layout of the track, and how many laps there would be, and reminded them all that anything went, so long as that anything was directed at a driver in a vehicle that was still functioning. She also mentioned surprises laid out on the course.

"Now," she concluded loudly and with enthusiasm, "Let's light it up! To the survivors goes the right to participate in the night race!"

Bumblebee didn't like the sound of that either, but he didn't have time to process all of the information before another girl stepped out into the road carrying a flag.

"Fina thinks you're something special," Rick whispered to Bumblebee, " _So prove_ _it_."

The girl in the road stood at the exact center of the line of vehicles, seeming to smile for each driver before she dropped the flag at the same time as some uncounted number of people blew air-horns. Caught in the front row, Bumblebee had cars on either side and one behind. Even had Rick not been at the helm, he couldn't have stayed where he was without causing an accident.

The roar of engines was deafening, but the cluster rapidly spread out as they left the starting line. Not only did the road broaden out, but some drivers simply couldn't keep up. Many of the cars had been modified to improve their racing ability, and the ones that hadn't quickly fell behind.

The pushing and shoving started almost immediately, as aggressive drivers tried to narrow the competition by damaging other vehicles with their own and hoping to shatter their opponent's nerves in the process. Bumblebee wasn't part of that, Rick driving him rapidly to the front of the pack.

But as they went into the first turn, Bumblebee was caught on the left side by a bright flash. Rick jerked the wheel, and Bumblebee obeyed before he processed what had happened. Someone had triggered a series of flares attached to the top of the concrete barrier. It had acted as intended, startling the driver into avoiding it and giving other drivers opportunity to catch up.

However, he first car to try hit a small patch of black ice and slid hopelessly sideways, the front of it clipping Bumblebee's back fender. Metal squealed and tore and Bumblebee wobbled on the road. Rick fought to keep him from spinning out, but he still wound up slightly angled on the road. Though they hadn't stopped, it had slowed them down, and a green sports car sped past them a little too close, smashing into Bee's front fender. Straight on the road again, Rick hit the accelerator, just in time to avoid being rear-ended. Bumblebee had never seen humans drive like _this_ before, and he knew why. This was absolutely insane and extremely dangerous and there was no good reason to do it. Especially not on ice.

In the mirror, Bumblebee could see cars behind them swing wildly around the vehicle that had slid on the ice, some of them hitting what was left of the ice in the process. One car slammed front first into the side of the halted vehicle, sending it skidding sideways along the road for several yards.

But the worst of the chaos was behind them. Though some other cars managed to get past them before Bumblebee hit his stride again, there was more black ice, more distracting flares and more overcompensation on the part of various drivers. Soon there were only three cars ahead.

"Come on!" Rick was probably just speaking to himself, but it seemed like he was addressing Bee, "I will not be left behind. Not again! Go!"

They were on a straight piece of the road, but quickly running out of pavement. A long straight stretch was just dirt, though someone had taken the trouble to clear the snow off to the sides of it. Exposed to the sunlight, the ice on the dirt had melted slightly, then been frozen over by the cold air, making it hard and slick. Bee saw the hazard coming, but Rick was focused on catching up to the other cars.

All Bee could do was cut power, which caused him to slow down as the cars ahead hit the ice. They slid forward, then one spun sideways only to have the car behind it slam into it and keep on going. The third vehicle weaved like a drunken skater as the driver tried to keep control, before finally skidding into the other two entangled vehicles. Rick still had the accelerator pressed to the floor, and would have plowed hard into the mess had Bee been listening to him. Two cars which had been hot on their tail passed them, hit the ice and smashed into the three car pile up.

One car flipped onto its top when it hit where the asphalt started again, and spun helplessly. Another car, driven off the road, hit a pole and began to smoke. The rest of them pushed, shoved and slid their way apart and back onto the course. By the time Bee hit the ice, it had been pretty chopped up by the other cars, though he still refused to acknowledge Rick's flooring it until they reached the other side.

"Move it, you piece of junk!" Rick smacked the wheel impatiently as Bee's front tires bit into the asphalt, slipped and then found purchase enough to pull his back tires out of the deepening slush.

Bumblebee felt he could do without the commentary. He also would have appreciated not having Rick at the helm. Rick was the worst driver Bumblebee could imagine; it was almost as if he was trying to get himself killed. Considering the speeds and the number of cars involved, he would have done just that had he hit the iced dirt at the speed he'd asked for. He'd have wound up between the smoking car and the pole, or else the flipped car would have landed right on top of him and possibly crushed him.

Bumblebee had almost no input in how he drove, he could not turn, accelerate or break on his own. All he could do was ignore a turn, or not turn as tightly as he was asked, refuse to accelerate or at least not accelerate as fully, or be slow in breaking. He could refuse to obey, but he could do nothing himself. It was precious little control when your driver was as suicidally aggressive as Rick seemed to be. What was the boy trying to prove anyway? What were _any_ of these people trying to prove?

Bumblebee had done things far more dangerous than this, but that was because he was a soldier and it was war. At the time, he had been fighting for his world and his comrades. To participate in _this_ just for sport was complete madness. Racing, he understood. But this wasn't racing.

They were in the fifth spot by the end of the first lap, having narrowly avoided several other pileups. Many of the participating vehicles were already looking pretty ragged, one even had half its rear bumper dragging on the ground and spitting up sparks. Bumblebee knew Rick had to have noticed that Bee was only intermittently responding to cues he was given, and seldom responding perfectly. But he hadn't spoken in awhile, except to curse whenever another car passed them.

Bumblebee's competitive nature drove him to fight for first, but he was more concerned with making it out of this alive, and having Rick come out the same way. He remembered a time when he would have been reckless enough to take every risk this race demanded of the victor, but that was long ago, on another world. He would take no gamble with a human's life if he didn't have to.

* * *

"Hey guys, I think I found something!" Raf said excitedly.

Arcee, Bulkhead and Ratchet looked up as Raf sent the video link so that it would show up on the large monitor instead of his comparatively tiny laptop screen. On the screen appeared shaky camera footage of what appeared to be a car race being held on the street. Snow was piled on either side of the course, and the cars were almost beyond the camera's sight when the Autobots started watching. The cars were coming closer however, and it was soon evident that one of the badly scuffed, frosted and muddy vehicles was a yellow and black Urbana 500.

Arcee's brow furrowed, and it was clear the other two were also somewhat skeptical.

"What would Bee be doing in a race like this?" Arcee asked.

"All I know is that I found it on a website. I was supposed to have a password to get to the video, but I broke in. I can't seem to find the location on the website, but this is a live stream."

He broke off as a black car slammed into the side of the yellow and black Urbana, trying to force the smaller vehicle off the road and into the deep snow. Not just deep snow. Hidden in the snow was a concrete barrier, because they were coming up on a bridge. Sparks flew as the Urbana clung to the road, refusing to be shoved off. Its left side hit the concrete barrier and it was pinned between that and the black car, which continued to pressure it. Other cars crowded in behind, so slowing down was not an option unless they moved, which they seemed disinclined to do.

"That impact would have crumpled an ordinary Earth vehicle," Ratchet observed.

"Then it's gotta be Bumblebee," Bulkhead said.

It was then that the Urbana began to fight for the lead. Evidently, car or driver or both had had just about enough of this. The yellow car gained inches on the black car, despite being pinned on two sides. A red car swung by on the other side of the black car. Evidently the black car's driver realized they were sacrificing too much speed and gaining nothing in pinning the Urbana, because they suddenly pulled away, giving the yellow car freedom to move off the railing.

With the pack of cars hot on its tail, the only place the yellow car could go was forward. And go forward it did, accelerating at a phenomenal rate to overtake first the black car, and then coming up behind the red as if the latter were stalled out. It was all the confirmation they needed, even though the vehicles were too far away from the camera to show many of the details. No Urbana could move like the yellow car did when it passed the red.

"We must find out where this race is taking place," Optimus spoke, having come in unnoticed by the others, "And find out why our Scout is participating in it."

As he spoke, the yellow car hit something slick on the road. It wobbled without losing control, but slowed down sufficiently for the red car to catch up. The red's front came even with the back fender of the Urbana. And then the driver of the red car turned the wheel sharply. The red car slammed into the side of the Urbana and the squeal of shearing metal could be heard even above the gasp of the crowd. The black car smashed into the red of the slowing red car, and the combined impact sent the hind tires of the Urbana right off into the snow. Yet another car smashed head-on into the left side of the Urbana.

Raf saw the Autobots wince out of the corner of his eye, and he knew it was a bad collision, a lot for even an Autobot to take. Another car, sliding helplessly on the ice, rode up the back of the car which had slammed into Bumblebee's side. It crashed down on top of Bee. Instead of admitting defeat, the car's driver floored it, and the tires spun in the air. The vehicle shifted, but not evenly. It crashed down onto the front right fender and then flipped onto its back into the deep snow drift.

Bumblebee had evidently had enough, and accelerated out of the pileup. When he flashed close to the camera, it was evident his paint was badly scraped, and he was sporting some nasty looking dents. It was also clear that there was a human behind the wheel.

"We need to find who that kid is," Arcee said angrily as Raf captured a still shot of the driver's face, which was indistinct because of the sheer speed of his vehicle and shakiness of the mediocre camera, "If we find out where he lives, we find Bumblebee."


	12. Don't Trust in Love

Bumblebee understood a little better what it was all about when, after the race, Rick got out and went up to the blond who'd dropped the flag. It soon became clear that this was Tracy, and it was evident that she was more committed to being broken up than Rick was.

Bee might not understand much about humans, but he knew rejection when he saw it. In fact, the girl did more than reject him. She yelled at him, and even slapped him. It was obvious she felt at least part of the blame for what had happened to her brother, Mark, rested on Rick's shoulders. It was unclear if she was mad at him for telling Eddy, or for not telling Mark first. It was unclear, especially since Bumblebee was listening from a distance and mostly caught the screaming and emphatic gesturing.

Finally, Rick threw up his hands and stalked to where Bumblebee waited. He threw himself down in the driver's seat and slammed the door, but didn't immediately do anything else.

Evidently, he'd been in that race to impress Tracy, and she hadn't been impressed. In fact, she seemed to be as angry now as Rick had been when he'd first come into the garage that morning. He wasn't angry now though. Conflicted emotions flickered through his eyes, until he leaned against the seat and closed them, obviously trying to make himself relax, but not doing very well at it.

After awhile, he turned the key in the ignition and Bumblebee's engine sprang to life in response.

Bumblebee felt tired and beat up, but he knew full well that he had sustained only minor damage, mostly cosmetic. As one of the five cars to have survived the race relatively intact, Bumblebee was slated to run the after dark race, so it surprised him when Rick turned him around and drove back to where the traffic cones had been replaced, pausing to wait for the teens nearby to scurry out and move them out of his way, then drove off. He supposed maybe they were just going to come back later.

When he got out, Rick had circled Bee once, probably to make sure his license plate, lights and bumpers were all still properly attached. It didn't appear to surprise him that Bee was entirely in one piece, just badly scratched and dented. Considering that more than one car had burst into flames today and how many collisions Bee and Rick had been directly involved in, it should have.

"I didn't believe Fina before," Rick said as he drove, "But I happen to know from experience that you were only listening to me about half the time out there. And there's no way you came away in one piece if you were really the car you appear to be. Now, I'm betting you've got some kind of advanced anti-collision software or something. Fina went a step farther. She says you can talk. I don't know that I believe that but, if you can, I'm telling you now: don't bother, I don't want to hear it. My parents already read me the riot act more times than I care to count, I don't need to hear whatever it is Dad programmed you to say."

Bumblebee didn't need anyone to tell him that this kid was lying. There was no sense in addressing a program with these words or tone of voice. On some level, Rick knew Bumblebee was more than just some piece of software, even if he was denying that to himself. Fina herself had said it, and it hadn't been the first time a human had done so. Cybertronians had a presence, humans were able to sense on some level that they weren't simply another machine. It didn't hurt their disguise any, because people would normally shrug it off or -because they were in public with other people around- not even notice it at all. Not unless they were purposely looking for it would they notice.

Bumblebee had more than once encountered someone who knew without knowing. On one occasion, a little old lady getting out of her own car had smacked Bumblebee in the next parking space with her purse. She had apologized, patted his fender and gone on her merry way, seemingly unaware of what she had just done because she had acted without thinking about it. Like as not, she had almost immediately forgotten the incident. Bumblebee would have too, except that it had happened before and since, in much the same way. People just knew life when they saw it, even if they didn't realize it.

They drove until they came to a parking lot. Bumblebee didn't know a lot about stores, having never been inside of one, but something about this strip put him ill-at-ease.

Rick found a parking space and put Bumblebee there, but he didn't get out immediately. Instead, he pulled out his wallet and counted the bills in it, then sat back for a seemingly thoughtful moment.

"Jason, a guy that works here, buys drinks for minors. We pay double retail, but it's worth it for those of us who can afford it. Wait here," Rick didn't appear to realize the implication of his instruction as he climbed out of the car and crossed the parking lot to enter the establishment.

So far, Bee hadn't been especially fond of how anything had been going since Ratchet had first sent him out to check the possible Decepticon activity what seemed like a lifetime ago. He was a soldier, prepared to have to fight, to kill, to endure torture, even to die for what he believed in. But what had happened to him the past few days was not covered by his training or experience, and he didn't know how to get out of this, or how to make any of what he'd seen better. He was helpless in a way he'd never been before. Helpless to keep the people around him from actively and intentionally ruining their lives.

A few minutes later, Rick came out of the building with a bottle in a paper sack. When he got in the car, he twisted around and set the bag in the back seat. Bumblebee didn't know what it was, but he didn't like it. He followed well enough to understand that Rick had somehow subverted the law to get that bottle, and he wanted no part in the deception or illegality of it.

Unfortunately, there wasn't really anything he could do about it, and it wasn't long before he found himself following Rick's directions to drive up a hill, then off the road to a patch of dirt near the edge of a bluff overlooking a large lake. A guardrail stopped him from driving right off the edge, but Bumblebee knew that he could not only jump it, but actually break through it without sustaining any significant damage. When Rick turned him off the road and drove him up to the railing so that his front bumper almost touched it, Bumblebee was half afraid the boy would try to drive him right off the edge even though there was no good reason to do that.

But Rick shifted him into park, reached back and retrieved the bottle instead.

Bumblebee would shortly find out that was actually much worse.

* * *

"Any closer to finding out where he is?" Arcee asked, somewhat impatiently.

"Not since you asked five minutes ago," Ratchet replied with no small measure of annoyance.

"Sorry," Arcee apologized, "I just feel so useless. I mean, Bee's out there doing who knows what for who knows what reason and all I can do is just stand here, waiting for you to narrow it down a bit from 'a place that has snow and road construction'. I mean, we don't even know he's still there."

"Maybe not, but we do know he's scheduled to come back," Raf supplied, not looking up from his laptop, which was running a program to try and match the landmarks visible in the video to a location.

"How do we know that?" Arcee asked.

Not glancing from his screen, Raf pulled up a web page and sent it to one of Ratchet's monitors. The page showed pictures of five cars. The picture on the left was before the first race, the one on the right was after it. The license plates were cropped out of the photos or otherwise not pictured. Bumblebee's photos were from the side, so his license wouldn't have been visible anyway.

"That's not right," Arcee observed, pointing to the picture of Bumblebee's left side prior to the race (the angles had been chosen to show off the worst of the damage the cars had sustained, with them being photographed on all sides prior to the race and then only two before shots picked to be paired with the after shots), "Bee doesn't have any scratches like that on his side."

Ratchet looked up from what he was doing and took a closer look at the photograph. He hadn't even noticed before. Bumblebee had been identified by them from the race footage, and he had barely even glanced at the post race results and ad for tonight's race. Now he actually looked, the dent and deep scratch from fender to fender on Bumblebee's left side was impossible to miss.

"That's new," Ratchet said, pulling up the image on his main screen and expanding it to look more closely at the pre-race damage, "Not more than a day or two old, I'd say."

"Yeah, maybe," Arcee persisted, "But that's not just paint damage. Bee would've had to be involved in a serious altercation with something or someone to get body damage like that, right?"

Arcee knew as well as Ratchet what it took to dent the plating of a Cybertronian's armor, because denting the same was in her everyday job description.

"It's hard to say from this image, but it looks like he may have acquired some of the paint off of whoever or whatever he scraped against," Ratchet said, "the damage isn't serious, but it looks like he clipped another vehicle, probably one going the other way by the stress patterning."

Ratchet was referring of course to the way the metal surface had bent in response to the 'stress' of being dented. Arcee didn't disagree, which was hardly surprising since Ratchet was the expert.

"But what does that tell us?" Bulkhead, quiet until now, asked.

"It tells us he was probably in an accident sometime after we lost touch with him, but before the race," Ratchet replied, then looked to Raf, "Rafael..."

"I'm on it," Raf replied before Ratchet could finish.

If Bumblebee was involved in an accident, then surely there must have been a police report of it, or something. If nothing else, some other car was looking much worse for wear and maybe in a repair shop even now. If not even that, then maybe a traffic camera would have picked it up. If they could find evidence of an accident involving and Urbana 500, even to just finding a camera recording of an Urbana 500 and a damaged vehicle passing the same place at nearly the same time (assuming the accident itself had gone unrecorded), they could cross reference with what their location software had come up with concerning the illegal racetrack. It was a bit of a long shot, just because of the sheer amount of time and number of possible locations, but maybe, just maybe they could speed up the process of finding Bumblebee.

* * *

After he'd been drinking awhile, Rick started talking.

He explained to Bumblebee with slurred speech that he'd been hoping to run away with Tracy, that this city had nothing worthwhile to offer him. He continued that he'd picked Bee because he didn't believe what Fina said, and that he felt the Urbana would be less conspicuous than the Jag with its custom license plate. Besides, running away from home meant he wouldn't have much in the way of money, and he had not forgotten what his father said about never needing to fill the gas tank. He said that Tracy had been the one to break up with him because she found out that Fina had cheated on Eddy with her brother Mark, and Rick had known but not said anything. He said now Tracy was mad at him because him telling Eddy had gotten Mark into the hospital. She wouldn't go with him, so he said he'd just be going alone without her.

"I was kind of hoping to crack up and win her sympathy, but you just couldn't let that happen, could you?" Rick accused, "You just had to keep going, like your indes... ind... well, like you can't be broken. So now... now I'm going alone. With you. With you alone. And... somewhere... we'll have to get those dents pounded out and splash a fresh coat of paint, otherwise... well, you'll stick out more than the Jag."

Bumblebee couldn't see what the percentage of crashing would have been in terms of improving Rick's relationship with Tracy, but then he'd stopped following the logic of all this almost as soon as he'd been present with it. To him, it all looked very stupid and juvenile, but he supposed it was probably because he simply didn't understand enough about human culture.

"Well, guess I'd better hit the road. I want to win that race first, though," Rick said, "You don't need a sober driver, do you?" Bumblebee declined to answer, "Good, 'cause you haven' got one."

He shifted into Drive and tried to accelerate, but Bumblebee refused to move because he was still facing the guardrail. After a few seconds, Rick seemed to realize his mistake and shifted into Reverse, then turned the wheel as Bee backed up so he could get onto the road again.

The bottle he'd left on the passenger seat tipped over and proved it wasn't entirely empty as it began to spill its contents onto the seat cover. Rick dove for the bottle, forgetting the wheel. As he righted it, Bumblebee wondered if Rick would've done that in any other car. He hoped not, otherwise this kid would be in for a very short future. Whether he liked Rick or not, he didn't want the boy to die.

Unlike the night before with Fina at the wheel, Bumblebee paid attention and didn't allow Rick to drift him over into the wrong lane. He realized they weren't heading back the way they'd come, but when they blew past a road construction sign, Bee simply assumed they were coming in from a different direction, though he was pretty sure only one road connected to the race track.

Then they came to a sign in the middle of the road. The sign said that the bridge ahead was under construction and not safe to drive on. That was an understatement. As they approached, Bumblebee could see that the middle of the bridge wasn't merely under construction, it didn't even exist yet.

Rick, however, didn't seem to see the problem and tried to accelerate.

Bumblebee did not heed the instruction, cutting power and praying he would roll to a stop before reaching the raw emptiness that lay ahead. He continued forward against his will, until his front bumper came into contact with the sign. It fell over, but he came to a stop.

"What the hell?" Rick muttered, pressing the accelerator, then banging the wheel, "Move!"

He leaned forward, reached across the dash, and hit the button.


	13. What Life's Really Worth

Bumblebee squealed involuntarily as pain surged through him on electrical currents. It was difficult to perceive the passage of time through the white-hot agony that pulsed through him, but he gradually began to realize that Rick wasn't letting go. Rick was going to force him to obey or face oblivion. Bumblebee continued to squeal, unable to articulate even if he should have wanted to, blind in his pain, knowing it would stop if he just rolled forward, but also knowing that doing so would send him over the edge of the bridge and down to whatever lay below. Bumblebee might survive the fall, but Rick would surely be killed when they hit the bottom.

Bumblebee couldn't see through the static which filled his vision as the shock administered by the depressing of the button overwhelmed and scrambled his systems, he couldn't think straight, and the temptation to just give in was unbearable. Still, he held his ground and did not move, waiting for the end, which he was waveringly certain would be his own. He wasn't sure how long he could make himself ignore that he had a way out of the world of hurt he'd entered into.

He owed Rick nothing, and all he'd learned about Rick and his family said there was nothing good, nothing here that was worth saving. The more he'd learned, the more strongly he'd come to dislike Rick and his entire family. Besides which, Rick's own family didn't appear to like him either. Rick was mean, spiteful and arrogant and self-centered, with no redeeming qualities that Bumblebee was aware of. And yet still the Scout held his ground and refused to let the boy kill himself.

Bumblebee understood now that it was easy to want to save humanity if you saw them as being like Raf, Jack or even Miko. All of them were nice (or niceish, in Miko's case), each had positive qualities and clearly wanted to help save the world and cared deeply for people besides themselves, and had people who loved them. It was even easy to want to protect a human Bee didn't know, because he could imagine they had loved ones who would miss them if they were gone, could assume they had something good to offer the world. It was much harder to want to save someone like Rick, whom he had gotten to know uncomfortably well the past few days, and who seemed to have nothing good in his soul. Even if his death did make his family sad, Bumblebee couldn't really say he cared whether Fina or their father was sad, because the both of them were just as bad as -if not worse than- Rick himself.

Leaning across the dash as he was, Rick inadvertently hit the power on the radio, and a hideously bad, jangling rendition of some traditional Christmas carol blasted through the speakers. It jarred Bumblebee's concentration, and he let himself roll forward a couple of inches before regaining his focus on resistance. The deafening and bad music only added to his torment, but it also seemed to finally break Rick's resolve.

The release of the button was a new kind of torment, as raw nerves seemed to cringe in sympathy with one another, the memory of pain and remnants of electricity shuddered through Bee while Rick sat back and powered off the radio, which fell mercifully silent.

Rick got out so suddenly that the opened door bounced and slammed itself shut, staggered to the edge of the road and threw up in the grass. Wiping his mouth and straightening up, Rick looked around at the growing early darkness of winter. Then he staggered back to Bee, tried to open the door while leaning against it, almost knocked himself down and then managed to swing the door open and practically fall across the seats, nearly sliding onto the floor before catching himself.

Bumblebee wasn't sure if all that had been a reaction to the drink or music, but he was immeasurably relieved that Rick seemed to have had enough of hitting that damned button for now.

Rick muttered something unintelligible into the seat cushion.

 _{What?}_ Bumblebee asked without thinking.

Rick lifted his head and replied, having understood the questioning tone, if not the inquiry itself, "I said 'you're stupid'," that said, he flopped back against the cushion.

 _{Me? I'm not the one trying to dive face first off a cliff!}_ Bumblebee protested.

"I don't get what your problem is!" Rick said, lifting his face out of the cushion again, "You seemed willing enough to race this morning!"

Bumblebee was still shivering internally with residual pain, and his voice had a tremor in it as a result, but it didn't really matter because Rick couldn't understand him in the first place. Some part of him realized that yelling at Rick was a waste of time, but he couldn't seem to stop himself.

 _{Forget the piece of scrap race!}_ Bumblebee exclaimed, _{I'm just trying to keep you from getting killed! If you don't like it, why don't you get out and walk off the edge by yourself because I'm not going to carry you there!}_

"Okay, okay, I get it!" Rick shouted, sitting up suddenly, then almost tipping over when that made him dizzy, "Fina was right, you're alive! Now will you quit making that awful racket!?"

Bumblebee whirred with frustration, so upset that he couldn't form a coherent sentence. Not only didn't Rick understand what Bee was saying, he seemed to think the Scout had stalled out just to prove a point, when really it had been to save Rick's life. Bumblebee would never have been able to endure that pain _just_ to prove a point. He'd barely been able to in order to save a life.

In the dimming twilight, Bumblebee realized now even a sober human probably couldn't see the absence of the bridge ahead, and it was obvious a drunken one could not either. Rick did not appear to have noticed the sign about the construction on the bridge when it was upright, and now Bee had knocked it over so now it was not visible through the windshield.

"I told you to shut up," Rick said, leaning over and fumbling for his cell phone, which had become wedged in the seat cushions.

He dug it out and struggled to punch in a phone number. Evidently, he hit the wrong speed dial number, because he wasn't pleased with the person who answered the phone.

"Fina? Shit, I was tryin' to call Eddy," he paused as Fina responded on the other end of the line, "No, no, no, don't hang up. You're as good as anybody, I guess," a pause, "Yeah, whatever. Look, I'm stranded out here. Damned Urbana quit on me. Where am I?" he twisted in his seat to look for a street sign, but there wasn't one, "I dunno... somewhere near the race track, I think. Yes, of _course_ I was racing! Look, your precious car is fine, it just stalled is all, it's being stubborn. Yeah, I know what I said. No, I'm not drunk!... okay, fine, yes I'm a little drunk, but this stupid piece of shit car-... _you_ watch _your_ mouth, I'll call it whatever I like... Just come and get me, okay?!... FINE!" he ended the call and slammed the phone down onto the seat.

It bounced, fell onto the floor and slid under the seat.

"Brat," Rick said, then tipped over across the seats again.

The silence that followed was an immense relief to Bumblebee. He'd had just about all he could take of people yelling and screaming at each other and him, not to mention all the crying. He'd never been around people who were so angry at everything, including themselves.

Bumblebee was nearly exhausted, still in pain, and so rattled that he almost couldn't believe he was on the side of those who were trying to save this crummy planet...

* * *

They'd had no luck at all tracking down a vehicle that might have been damaged by a collision with an Urbana 500 matching Bumblebee's description. And all their other attempts at narrowing it down were for naught. That left them with only the upcoming race. They could only hope that, not only would Bumblebee be there, but that the camera would pick up something that would tell them where he was. A car's state license, someone wearing a jersey for the local sports team... something, anything.

"I can't believe we're hoping Bee's reckless enough to participate in a demolition derby. Again," Arcee remarked unhappily.

"I don't think it's his choice," Raf told her, "I was watching the highlight reel on the site, and there's something not right about it."

"I'll say," Arcee said.

"No, not like that," Raf said, "I mean... there's something wrong with the way Bee's driving."

"How do you mean?" Arcee inquired.

"I mean the way he was driving... it wasn't... well, it wasn't like him. Like someone else was doing the driving and he was just along for the ride."

"Cybertronians ain't real big on behind the wheel drivers," Bulkhead said.

"I know," Raf told him, "But, somehow, I don't think Bee had a choice."

"He better not have," Arcee said, "Or else he'll need a pretty good explanation about all of this."

* * *

Rick didn't move for a long time. When he finally did, it was to turn on his side, whereupon he began snoring. It was over an hour after he called Fina that bright headlights finally cut through the night, and Bumblebee heard the distinctive purring of a Jaguar's engine. He knew that had to be Fina, though he was very surprised that Rick would have let her have access to the keys for the Jag.

Fina had barely put the car in park when she got out and ran towards where Bumblebee sat. She jerked open the door on the driver's side, startling Rick into semi-lucid wakefulness.

"Ricky! What the hell are you doing out here!? Don't you know the bridge isn't finished yet!? Ugh, your breath stinks, get your face away from me!"

"What bridge?" Rick asked, rubbing his eyes as if trying to clear blurred vision.

"No bridge!" Fina corrected, "Come and look!" she grabbed his arm and practically pulled him from the car, then dragged him over to where he could see that there wasn't a bridge just ahead, "SEE!? See the obvious lack of bridge!? If that car had let you go forward, you'd be in several bloody pieces on the river bank. Down there!" she pointed emphatically.

Comprehension was slow to come to Rick. When it finally did, he slid from Fina's grasp and onto his knees, then onto his hands and knees.

"Oh," he breathed, "Oh God, I'd be dead."

"You sure would," Fina said, heatedly crossing her arms and exhaling sharply, her breath frosting in the light Bumblebee's headlights were providing.

Ignoring her, Rick staggered to his feet, and swung towards Bumblebee. He lost his balance and fell forward, catching himself by planting his palms on Bee's hood.

"You...," he said softly, "You didn't break down... you... you saved my life."

"You're not the only one he's saved," Fina said quietly, "There's something special about this car. Something dad's keeping from us. And that button he told us to press... that hurts him somehow. The car, that is. And the buzzing we were told to listen for? It seems to be how he talks."

"He?" Rick wondered.

"Yes, he."

"But cars are always 'she'. That's tradition," Rick said, still leaning on Bee's hood.

"Well, this one isn't a she."

"How can you tell?"

"He doesn't feel like a she," Fina replied with a shrug, "He's just a he, that's all."

"Well... does _he_ have a name?" Rick asked, looking at Fina now, but still leaning heavily on Bee.

"I dunno," Fina shrugged, then crossed her arms again, "Probably."

"He sounded like a hornet's nest when he was yelling at me earlier," Rick said, then rubbed the back of his neck ruefully, "Probably telling me off for trying to drive to my death."

"Yeah, but he didn't seem to like it when I said he sounded like a wasp," Fina replied, "It seemed to make him mad."

"So, like... now what?" Rick asked, "I mean, what do we do?"

 _Let me go home_ , Bumblebee thought desperately, but there seemed no way for him to make them understand.

"Well, we can't just leave him here," Fina said.

"I'm supposed to be racing again in an hour," Rick told her, "With this car."

"You're thinking about racing now!?" Fina exploded angrily, "That's what you're worried about?!"

"No!" Rick snapped, "But I made a commitment. I said I'd be there."

"Oh like you've never broken your word before."

"Not to Tracy," Rick said quietly, after a pause.

Fina fumed, then finally took a deep breath, "Alright, fine. If the car will start, I'll lead you back to the race track and you can finish what you started. But-" she waved a finger in his face, "You owe me."

"Fine, sure, I don't care," Rick said, pushing past her and using Bumblebee for support as he maneuvered around the car and into the driver's seat, "Let's just go already."

Fina shut the door for him and ran back to where she'd parked the Jag. Bumblebee was tempted to just not start and end this before he got in any deeper. But he couldn't really think of a good reason to stay out here, and he found that he did sort of want to race again, even though he was increasingly concerned about Rick's safety. He couldn't think of a way to get home without securing the cooperation of these two, and it seemed like winning this race for Rick might be a step towards that.

Still, he hesitated when Rick tried to start his engine.

"Come on, I promise I won't try to get in a wreck this time," Rick pleaded.

Reluctantly, Bumblebee turned over his engine, backed up, turned around and followed Fina back up the road. He couldn't think of anything else to do. Even though they knew now that he was alive and could be hurt, neither Rick nor Fina had taken a single step towards offering him his freedom.

As he moved, it came to him that he really wasn't up to racing right now. He hadn't moved since his refusal to drive off the edge of the unfinished bridge. Now he was moving, he felt the full effects of what had just been done to him. He had to work harder to get up to speed, and turning was difficult. Once he started moving, he realized the only thing he wanted was to stop. Left to his own devices, he'd have decided moving wasn't worth the trouble.

But a part of him knew that, if Rick didn't race with him, Rick would race with the Jag. In his present condition, Rick really would get himself killed. However Bumblebee felt, whatever he thought of this people, he couldn't just let that happen. Not when he could do something to prevent it. He wasn't really sure that he _could_ prevent it but, if Rick was going down, Bumblebee was going with him.

Bumblebee hadn't started this, and he didn't owe either of these kids anything, but he'd come too far to abandon them now, much as he might have liked doing that.


	14. Thank God It's Them Instead of You

Temporary lights had been set up near the starting area where the crowd was gathered, their breath turning to frost in the deepening night, but the course ahead was unlit and -Bumblebee knew from experience- littered with surprises meant to make the race more 'interesting'. Sudden lights flashing during the day were startling, but a collection of flares lit suddenly in the dark would be like the beginnings of a bomb going off. Bumblebee didn't like the intermingling of racing and things reminiscent of warfare, especially since he knew most of the driving would be out of his control.

He tried to remember at what point and for what reason it had seemed like a good idea to race against a bunch of amateurs whose idea of 'interesting' was adding the potential for a startled driver to wind up getting himself and/or whoever happened to be close to him killed.

Fina, who had arrived ahead of them, came running over and Rick rolled down the window.

Leaning in, Fina said, "You didn't tell me Eddy was here!"

"I didn't know," Rick replied, "What's he driving?"

"What do you _think_?" Fina practically squealed, "He's driving Mark's Noble."

Bumblebee had noticed the Noble earlier. The sleek maroon car had been very aggressive, but had avoided physical contact as much as possible. During the earlier race, the vehicle had repeatedly swung towards other cars, alarming their drivers into turning away, sometimes resulting in a spin out, a couple of times hitting guardrails and more than once crashing into vehicles on the other side of them. Evidently, Rick was not the only one who was racing angry, assuming Eddy was as mad now as he'd been the night of the party.

"Mark's letting him drive the Noble?" Rick asked, raising his eyebrows in surprise.

"'Letting' is probably an inaccurate term," Fina told him, "People don't _let_ Eddy do anything. He's pissed at Mark, and I think Mark would rather let him trash the Noble than be sent to the hospital again. Now get out, I'm driving," Fina grabbed the door handle and unlatched it.

"What? No you're not," Rick slammed the door, "I drove the first race, I'm driving this one."

"Ricky," Fina said, leaning through the window, " _You_ 're drunk. You want to win the race, and I want to wreck Eddy for what he did to Mark."

"Mark had it coming," Rick protested.

"Rick... _move_ ," Fina snarled through her teeth, eyes flashing.

To Bumblebee's surprise, Rick allowed her to open the door and he meekly stepped out.

Fina smiled brightly, said "Thanks," and slid behind the wheel.

Rick shut the door behind her, then leaned against it and spoke through the still-lowered window.

"Don't forget that Eddy's not the only one in this race. You've got three other drivers to worry about. Eddy took it easy on me today because I told him what went down between you and Mark. But he will not do that for you. He's going to try to wrap this car around the nearest post he can find."

"Ricky, relax," Fina said, adjusting the seat to suit her, "This isn't my first race."

"Maybe not, but this is a no holds barred, not one of your regulars."

"Want me to wait while you run and get me a helmet?" Fina said mockingly.

"I want you to try not to turn into a pavement smear out there."

"Yes, _Dad_ ," Fina rolled up the window and Rick stepped back.

Speaking of dads, Bumblebee wondered if Rick and Fina's dad knew that his kids participated in street racing. Routinely, from the sound of things. He was starting to wonder just what kind of damage Fina's convertible had really suffered. He was also starting to wonder exactly what _kind_ of convertible it was.

Fina settled more firmly into the seat and placed both hands on the steering wheel.

"Alright, time to show me what your made of," she said quietly.

 _{This is a very bad idea,}_ Bumblebee told her, but it seemed too late to argue.

The cars were driven up to the line one by one at a signal from Tracy. She beckoned each forward, forward, then told it to stop, making sure they were all perfectly even with one another. Bumblebee knew this wasn't how car races usually started, but he knew also that nobody here cared a whit about what an actual, legal, organized race looked like. They were doing as they pleased, right down to the way they arranged the starting line.

If Bumblebee had been a mere Urbana 500, every vehicle in the line would have had him outclassed for speed. All four of the other vehicles were among the fastest street legal cars on the market, and he could hear in the engine noise of two of them that they had been customized somehow. Bee wasn't a mere Urbana, but one of his biggest advantages had been stripped from him, and that was that he was both the car and the driver. He knew exactly what was happening as a car and as a driver both at the same time all the time, and he knew precisely what his limits were at any given moment and how to compensate. But he wasn't the driver now, Fina was, and he somehow doubted she was as good as he was. She couldn't possibly be.

The car which worried Bee the most was actually the one in first position. The black car had undoubtedly started life as an Urbana Viper, but had since been modified. Bumblebee had felt its power when it slammed him into a concrete guardrail during the first race; it was still an Earth vehicle but it was much sturdier than it would have been off the assembly line. It didn't move like a Viper either. More importantly, its driver was ruthless in the first race, and drove the competition into concrete barriers, poles, patches of ice and even one of the lit flare pits along the sides of the road. He didn't care who got hurt, so long as he finished the race. He'd have finished Bee for sure had the Scout not been armor plated.

Second position belonged to Eddy with his maroon Noble, which was missing its right side mirror, as well as a lot of paint along both sides. Bumblebee was positioned third, and so he had to put up with Fina and Eddy glaring at each other through the windows while the fourth car (a slightly modified red McLaren) and a fifth car (whose color and make were lost forever under the dents and scrapes) got into position.

 _{Careful, Fina,}_ Bumblebee advised, knowing it would do no good, _{Eddy is not the problem here.}_

"Hush," Fina told him, "I know what I'm doing, just follow my lead."

 _{Like I've got a choice.}_

Astoundingly, this field of cars had survived the first race, despite being built for speed and not overall sturdiness. With a full field that morning, there had been no opportunity to unleash the true speed of the vehicles, but plenty for drivers to lose by taking advantage of being allowed to bash into each other like a bunch of idiots. It had all really been about acceleration and control, which told Bumblebee more than a little about Eddy's skill behind the wheel, because he knew the Noble was mostly in the hands of the driver.

But with only five cars, and a different course charted, the sheer speed of the vehicles would be a bigger factor. In that, Bumblebee knew he was outmatched. He also knew that the lightest touch from another vehicle at higher speeds would lead to disaster. There wouldn't be any smashing into sides or pushing against bumpers this time. Every driver, if they wanted to live to the end, would be seeking to avoid hitting the other vehicles, or indeed getting anywhere near them.

It irked him that this was a race he could not win, not unless these four drivers who had somehow been good enough to survive the morning's race suddenly lost their skill or nerve for no reason. Even if Fina was a great driver (Who knew, maybe she was great in a race and just terrible as a regular driver on the street? Bumblebee had his doubts), even though Bumblebee was himself superior to the car he had modeled himself after, there was simply no way for him to compete with these cars. To some degree, no matter what he was made out of, Bumblebee was bound by the limits of the design of the vehicle he had chosen as his disguise. And too, Rick pushing the button earlier had left him rattled, and he knew he was weaker than before. It was his own strength that gave him speed, his spark and not his engine that moved him. And his spark felt weakened, his systems drained of power.

But he knew also that, regardless of the odds, he would put his all into the race. It was in him to go fast, to challenge other cars, to chase the wind itself in pursuit of greater speed. Had there been no war, had he never become a soldier, Bumblebee knew it was in his spark to race. It was something he'd almost forgotten under the weight of training, experience and the grief of a lost world. But when Jack had recently asked to 'borrow' Bumblebee for a race, Bee had realized that the long dormant need for speed still lay within him, that he still wanted to be the fastest car on the road.

It was stupid to race here and now, like this, but he was going to do it anyway.

And, now he was here, nobody would have to make him.

* * *

There were cameras strategically placed along the course, and Raf could see that there were traps lying in wait for the drivers at many of those points, meant to startle them and make the race 'more interesting'. They were different from the ones that had been there during the day, and they seemed to be running a different stretch of road this time, though from the same starting point or one just like it.

He noted the car that had given Bee such trouble earlier was there.

"Bumblebee is very much outclassed," Ratchet said.

Though he had no interest in racing that he'd displayed, Ratchet had made it a point to learn the specs of every vehicle mode the Autobots had chosen, or might have chosen. It only took him one look at the field to know that the other vehicles were all faster than Bumblebee. His only chance was to out-drive them, and it had been clear earlier that Bumblebee wasn't in charge of the driving.

"I'm more worried that black car's driver won't know when to quit," Arcee said seriously, "If he pulls the kind of stunts he did earlier, he's going to get someone killed. Maybe himself."

Raf couldn't believe the Autobots were discussing this. For one thing, he was only interested in finding out where Bumblebee was so they could get him back home where he belonged. For another, he had complete faith in Bumblebee's ability to do anything he set his mind to, including beating every car in that lineup, regardless of what the odds against him were. It seemed like they didn't have as much faith in Bumblebee as they ought to if they were worried about the black Viper's driver.

Then, quite suddenly, the race was underway. At the start, the Viper and unidentified car in the fifth spot took the lead, with the McLaren working not to be left behind. The Noble didn't get off as fast, but it still shot ahead of Bumblebee at once, and the distance increased rapidly.

The cars left black marks on the freshly laid pavement, and kicked back smoke from their tires as they launched. All except Bumblebee, whose takeoff was much smoother. At the start, he came out straight, where the others swerved slightly. But it wasn't enough to make up the distance they instantly put between him and them.

The Viper and fifth car closed on each other, coming dangerously near to touching as they swept into the first turn. The McLaren's driver wanted nothing to do with them in the turn and hung back, but the Noble was beginning to hit its stride, pulling even with the McLaren as they took the turn.

As they completed the turn, the fifth car wobbled. As had been feared, the black Viper had touched it, just barely brushing the fender. The Viper continued on as it hadn't even felt the touch at all.

"That's no Viper," Ratchet observed, "It looks like one, but under the hood..." he shook his head.

The fifth car managed to recover from its wobble, but the McLaren overtook it. Then the Noble hit its stride, and left both of them behind. It came up behind the Viper in a sickening rush of speed, but the Viper was having none of it. The black car slid in front of the maroon one, blocking it from advancing. Then it slid to the other side when the Noble's driver tried to get around the other way.

"It may not be a Viper," Raf said, "But it still doesn't have the speed of a Noble."

"And its driver knows it," Bulkhead put in.

The combat with the Noble slowed the progress of both vehicles, and the McLaren and fifth car caught up with them, though it was evident the fifth car was really working hard now. On a straight patch, the McLaren moved to challenge the Noble for second, but the fifth car labored past both of them to again fight the Viper for first. When the Viper swept into the path of the fifth car, the Noble took the opportunity to rocket into first place.

Then the track tilted uphill, and also curved. The Noble was forced to slow down, and the Viper ate up the gap between them, launching right past the Noble like it was standing still. The fifth car's driver evidently thought he could make it and fight the Viper for first at the same time. He couldn't.

The Viper was on the outside of the turn, with the fifth car trapped on the inside. It couldn't turn tight enough and brushed the Viper, which rocked but didn't move, instead catching the front of the fifth car. The rear wheel drive propelled it forward and it spun, landing sideways on the hill turn.

The Noble was in the clear, but the McLaren had to be cautious trying to thread the needle between the edge of the road and the stopped car. Bumblebee, coming in last, but not as far behind as one might have expected from the awkward start, should have been able to easily slide around the fifth car, but its driver chose that moment to try and turn around. At the high speed, on the dangerous uphill turn, that other car backed up into Bumblebee's path. This was no minor brush, Bumblebee's front right fender slammed into the back of the other vehicle. The combination of turn, hill and collision ripped him right off the road and he flipped, hit top down on the side of the hill and slid. The other car was pulled down with him and smashed into his rear bumper.

At the bottom of the hill, Bee slid across another patch of asphalt and then into a guardrail. The other car slammed into him, driving him forward, and the guardrail shattered his windshield. The force of impact tipped him over the guardrail and he landed upright on the other side, while the other car smashed into the guardrail, tearing the wearied metal outward. It cut into the front of Bumblebee.

And then the fifth car caught fire.


	15. The Ambulance

Bumblebee felt dizzy and sick, and not entirely sure what had happened. In the throttling darkness, he could faintly see wisps of smoke, and then flickering flame. He felt the guardrail that had slashed through his grill, but it hadn't cut too deeply. His shock absorbers were pretty much shot, and he could feel energon dripping from somewhere near his rear axle. But he was too numb with the shock to feel any real pain, only disorientation and disbelief. And then he felt the warmth of blood on his interior, and realized that the real damage had been done inside, when he'd slid down the hill, and then when his windshield had been shattered inward. Fina lay unconscious and bleeding, leaning forward against the seat belt. Anything less than an Autobot's structure and armor plating would have bent inward and crushed her during the accident, but Bumblebee had held together.

Fear pulsed through him, chasing away some of the numbness. He'd held together, sure, but what about Fina? Had Bumblebee been in physical control, he could have protected her from the force of the impact, but as it was he'd been able to do nothing. Hell, left on his own, he would not have taken the turn with that other vehicle sitting there, for exactly this reason.

 _{Fina? Fina, are you alright?}_ he felt a pang of guilt that he had allowed this to happen, and that cleared enough of the numbness that he could finally feel the open wound that was causing him to bleed, _{Fina, you need to wake up. Fina, the other car is on fire. You need to get out. Fina!}_

She did not respond to him, not even to moan. Bumblebee tried to see past the smoking vehicle, but it was dark here away from the track, the lights were far away, and so were the people, only a few of whom seemed to realize the severity of what had occurred.

With his one good headlight, Bumblebee caught the glint of metal in the darkness, and a moment later a car turned onto the road he'd slid across after reaching the bottom of the hill. When it got close enough, Bumblebee recognized the maroon Noble, and knew it was Eddy behind the wheel. He must have seen the accident in his mirror and come back. He couldn't have known there was a fire from the road, and so had come back without knowing the severity of the situation, effectively dropping out of the race in so doing.

Eddy braked a little too hard for the speed he was at and slid on the pavement, but he didn't lose control. Almost as soon as his car stopped, he jumped out of it and ran first to the flaming vehicle. He hadn't looked at the driver for more than a second before he vaulted the guardrail and ran to Fina.

He opened the door and reached in to pull the seat-belt free. He said Fina's name repeatedly, and his hands shook so badly he fumbled the latch on the seat-belt twice before he managed to free her of it. Then he hurriedly lifted her and carried her clear of the wreck. By the time Eddy set Fina on the ground at the edge of the road, another car arrived from the opposite direction.

Tracy was driving, with Rick riding shotgun. While Eddy returned for the driver of the other car, Rick exited the vehicle he'd arrived in and ran to kneel at his sister's side, fearfully repeating her name.

"Call an ambulance!" Rick shouted as Tracy started towards him, then he returned his attention to Fina, who was now murmuring something, "Fina, no. Just be quiet. It'll be alright, it's gonna be okay. Just stay with me. No, don't try to talk, just lie still alright," he continued to speak, holding one of her hands with his own, but she began to push him away and speak again.

Eddy had by this time pulled the other driver free and struggled to carry him to where Fina was. He set the other driver down, dropping to his knees heavily. Rick looked at him for a split second, then back at Fina, then at Eddy again. Then, astonishingly, he let go of Fina.

"Stay with her, alright?" he said to Eddy as he started getting up.

"Hey, where are you goin'?!" Eddy demanded.

"Just stay with her!" and then Rick was running towards Bumblebee.

In seconds, he'd climbed behind the wheel and started the engine. Bee's tires floundered in the mixture of snow and mud for a moment, then he began to back clear of the rail.

 _{What are you doing? Where are we going?}_ Bumblebee asked uneasily.

"Just don't give me any trouble you damn car," Rick breathed, "Just do as I tell you."

Bumblebee hadn't expected Rick to answer him, but the response he received didn't make him any less uneasy. Why was Rick leaving Fina hurt by the side of the road? Where was he taking Bumblebee? Surely he didn't intend to finish the race, did he?

But they didn't return to the course. In fact, they didn't even return to the crowd near the start/finish line. Instead, Rick aimed Bumblebee away into the darkness, and he felt the change from fresh pavement to dirt track even though his flickering headlight did little to illuminate the path ahead.

"You know, I don't get why Fina's so obsessed with you, especially right now," Rick said as they left the wreck, the track and everyone behind in the dark, "But she is. She wouldn't let me stay, insisted I get you out of here before any cops showed up. She's hurt back there, she could be..." his voice cracked, "She could be..." he gave up, "And she wants me to get some stupid car out of sight so the police won't impound it. How crazy is that, right? And how crazy is it that I'm actually listening to her?" he shook his head miserably, "Some holiday season this is."

Bumblebee couldn't begin to answer Rick about what Fina might be thinking. But he was grateful to her. One place he didn't want to find himself was in a police impound lot with no way of getting out. Sooner or later, someone would examine him more closely and then they'd realize that this so-called vehicle was not even slightly what it appeared to be. Fina couldn't possibly even begin to understand how important it was for that not to happen.

After leaving the construction area, Rick turned Bumblebee onto a switchback road that eventually led them to a spot almost directly above the race course. Parking Bumblebee at the side of the road, Rick moved to the guardrail and looked over, evidently wanting to see what would happen, even if he couldn't be there. From where Bumblebee sat, he could only hear the sirens as they approached, and faintly make out the spilling rays of blood red and bright blue lights of ambulances and police vehicles.

Bumblebee couldn't guess what Fina's motivation for protecting the truth about what he was might be, nor did he want to. Right now, the only things he cared about was keeping safe the secret of the Autobots existence, and knowing Fina was going to be alright. He could do nothing about the latter, and could only be grateful for the opportunity to accomplish the former.

Still, he was scared. He didn't know what came next.

* * *

Even as Bumblebee and the other car left the view of the camera, the live stream continued undaunted, revealing when the driver of the Noble left the race and went back to check on the accident. The end of the race belonged to the Viper, who very nearly demolished the McLaren when it brushed past to take the lead at the last second after the McLaren had held it for quite awhile.

But the event was cut short by the arrival of police cars. Someone holding a camera swung back and forth, capturing the action as participants, organizers and people from the audience scrambled to get out of there, which resulted in their temporarily blocking the path of an ambulance as the people ran back and forth across the road, seeking to vanish from the scene before the cops arrived.

Raf felt his breath catch in his throat as he realized what it meant that someone had called emergency services in. Someone in that accident was seriously hurt. A moment later, the Autobots seemed to catch on.

"Bumblebee wouldn't let a human get hurt," Arcee said, but she seemed to be trying to convince herself, "He'd do anything to protect them."

"Maybe not," Bulkhead said gently, "But we all know it wasn't Bee that took that crazy curve; he had the bearings to do it for sure, but the sense not to try."

"That's right," Raf said, "Bee wasn't driving, so whatever happened isn't his fault. It can't be."

"No one said it was," Ratchet muttered, distracted, still watching the stream.

The person carrying the camera chased after the ambulance, and soon came upon the scene of a smoking wreck and several people by the side of the road, two of them lying prone. However, Bumblebee was nowhere to be seen.

Raf was so busy trying to figure out what had happened, where Bumblebee might have gone and why, that it wasn't until Ratchet said it that he realized.

"We have our location," Ratchet said, pointing to the markings on the side of the ambulance.

Sure enough, painted on the ambulance was not only the state and county, but name of the town.

"Let's go," Arcee said, with a nod to Bulkhead, "Even if Bee took off, he wouldn't have gone far. One of those people on the ground was behind the wheel earlier. He wouldn't leave without knowing that she was being taken care of."

She seemed to be purposely forgetting that Bumblebee wasn't running the show anymore, but nobody reminded her of that. Instead, Ratchet decided on the coordinates, picking a place nearby but well outside of the view of anyone on or around the track.

"Bring him home," was all Raf could ask.

Arcee and Bulkhead transformed and drove through the Ground Bridge.

* * *

From above on the switchback, Bumblebee spotted the telltale glow of the Ground Bridge. When it deactivated, he recognized Arcee and Bulkhead immediately. He watched as they paused to inspect the chaos below, staying well out of view of any humans by keeping outside the lights and leaving their headlights darkened until they turned away. He knew they were looking for him.

He wished he could warn Rick, explain to him what was about to happen.

Hearing the sound of vehicles driving up the road, Rick left the guardrail and climbed behind the steering wheel. But when he turned the key in the ignition, Bumblebee did nothing.

"Come on, we need to go," Rick insisted, turning the key again.

 _{No, we don't,}_ Bumblebee replied, trying to force a sound like calm confidence into his voice.

"You want to get impounded by the cops?" Rick asked urgently, "Because that's what's gonna happen if you don't start."

 _{No, it's not. It's okay, Rick. Just take it easy. You'll be fine, and so will I.}_

Bumblebee watched Arcee and Bulkhead come into view. As they had been taught, Bulkhead hung back, using the darkness and window tint to hide that he had no driver, while Arcee -with her holographic rider- moved in closer, taking the lead. When she started speaking, people invariably assumed they were being addressed by the hologram, something she alone generated. When forced to address humans, the others darkened their windows and hung back. Except Bumblebee, who could never speak to humans and still maintain the secret of what he was.

"Get out," Arcee commanded brusquely.

"C'mon, start," Rick pleaded quietly, but Bumblebee ignored him.

With a frustrated sigh, Rick finally gave up. He didn't know what sort of person was on the motorcycle, but he assumed from the authoritative tone that it was a plain clothes cop. He didn't know enough to realize the signs were all wrong. Even if he had known it, he probably wouldn't have argued, not when his getaway vehicle was refusing to start.

"Step away from the muscle car," Arcee said.

Rick was obviously thinking fast, and realizing something didn't add up, "This is my dad's car. He'll be pissed if you steal it."

"I'm not stealing anything, kid," Arcee replied bluntly, "That car belongs with us."

It was true, but Bumblebee knew it was the wrong thing to say to Rick.

"If it belongs to you, then you know what's so special about it," Rick spat angrily, "And, if you know that, you know it doesn't _belong_ to _anybody_."

That statement gave Arcee pause, but only for a beat. Gunning her motor, she bounced forward a menacing inch, trying to intimidate Rick into backing down.

"What do you know about this car?" she demanded, and Bumblebee detected a note of fear in her voice that only someone who knew her very well and understood why she was afraid would notice.

"I know..." Rick hesitated, clearly having hoped to be able to continue denying what he knew was the truth, but now realizing he had to say it, "I know it saved my life... and my sister's life. And I'm not letting just anybody come and take it, that's for damn sure."

Arcee was taken aback by the assertion. Bumblebee knew she wanted to ask him if that was true, but if Rick didn't really know what he was claiming and was instead just guessing, any response Bumblebee offered her would be proof. Bee realized that he had to act and, in so doing, come to a decision he had been hoping would remain out of his hands.

 _{Arcee, it's okay. He doesn't know a lot, but he knows enough,}_ Bumblebee said.

"I'm not even going to ask how that happened," Arcee told him.

Rick jumped, surprised to realize that Arcee was addressing Bumblebee, because -unlike Rick and Fina- she was able to understand him when he talked. Rick hadn't even come far enough to understand that Bumblebee actually _was_ talking and not just making noises.

 _{There's more,}_ Bumblebee told her, _{But it all boils down to one main point.}_

"What are you sayin', Bee?" Bulkhead asked.

Bumblebee knew that Bulkhead had broken his silence because he was afraid he already knew the answer. Bulkhead was right, and ahead of Arcee for once.

 _{I'm saying,}_ Bumblebee said, struggling with the overwhelming weariness that hit him as he spoke, knowing how they would react, and what it meant that he was saying this, _{I'm not going back.}_

Arcee gasped, "What?"

 _{I'm staying here,}_ Bee reiterated, _{I have to.}_

"What do you mean you have to?" Bulkhead wanted to know.

 _{I have to... because what happened to that girl down there... it was my fault. I'm responsible for that. Now I have to stay here... and try to make it right.}_

"Bumblebee..." Arcee protested.

 _{Please, Arcee. Let me do this.}_

Arcee hesitated, knowing she would have to explain to Optimus when she got back exactly why she hadn't been able to bring Bumblebee in, and also knowing she would have to explain it to Raf. Bee hated to do that to her, but he didn't have another choice. Finally, Arcee sighed and backed off.

"Alright, Bee... okay."

 _{Thank you, Arcee.}_


	16. What a Fool I've Been

Bumblebee knew that Arcee had wanted to ask him a lot of questions. She'd wanted to ask him what good he thought he could do here. She'd wanted to ask him how he got here to begin with. She'd wanted to know whether he was trying to leave the Autobots for good. She'd probably wanted to know if he was completely out of his mind. She'd wanted the answers to questions Bumblebee couldn't even begin to guess at. And yet, she'd let him go.

Now the Autobots knew roughly where he was, it wouldn't be long before they'd come back and ask the questions Arcee hadn't before, when there wasn't a human around.

The problem was, Bumblebee didn't really have any good answers.

He didn't really owe these people anything, especially not since they had hurt him and forced him to do their bidding. And he couldn't begin to imagine what he could actually do for Fina or to atone for the fact that he had allowed his desire to race to overtake his common sense, that he had allowed his competitive nature to assert itself and permit a human to go into a dangerous situation with him. He'd put his own wants above that of humans. It didn't matter how he'd gotten here, or how awful these people were, they were still human and it was his job to protect them. Last night, he had failed in that duty.

He could not return to the Autobots until he had... what? Atoned for his mistake? How could he possibly hope to do that? He couldn't even talk to these people, and they had control of everything he did. What could he do for them? For Fina?

Bumblebee knew he was a mess. His paint was ruined, he was covered in dents, one of his side mirrors was hanging uselessly by a strip of twisted metal, his windshield had been bashed in and the glass littered his seats and flooring. The energon leak from the night before had stopped, but he still felt sore and vulnerable. But, for some reason, he'd found himself telling Arcee that he wanted to stay. And she, using reasoning too warped to contemplate, had allowed him to do just that.

Not only did he have no power, he was a Scout and she a Warrior, sent by Optimus to fetch him back. By rank and orders, she should have had Bulkhead tow him home. Bumblebee was a soldier in the Autobot army. He'd given up the right to do whatever he pleased the moment he'd joined the war.

On the other hand, his actions -or inaction- had caused a teenage girl to be hurt.

So lost in his thoughts was Bumblebee that he failed to notice when the red haired woman he'd seen briefly a few nights ago entered. He heard the light switch on near the side door, and observed the woman as she came around in front of the SUV and stood before him. Rick and Fina's mother was frowning, and Bumblebee recognized the anger in her eyes. It was a helpless anger, because it wanted to blame someone - _anyone_ \- other than the people involved. Bee had seen a lot of it recently.

"I don't know where Larry got you," she said, but Bumblebee didn't get the sense that she knew that the vehicle she addressed could hear and understand her, "but I wish he would take you back. Things may have been bad before, but now my Serafina is in the hospital. Because of you, my baby girl almost died. At least if Rick had been driving that damnable Jag, he never would have let Fina drive it."

 _You didn't see the look in her eyes,_ Bumblebee thought.

"Larry promised me -he _promised_ me- that this new car would make things different. That with this car, my children would be perfectly safe," she said, her voice rising in pitch if not volume.

 _Then why not blame him instead of me?_

"But you haven't been in this garage even a week, and look what's happened already. My beautiful girl in the hospital, and you're in this garage... still in one piece, when you should be in a scrapyard!"

 _Who would you blame if I'd been destroyed? Your son? Your husband?_

Bumblebee was prepared to take responsibility for his part in what had happened, but he wasn't about to pretend he'd been the only party involved. But he supposed it was easier to blame a piece of machinery than to realize your loved ones made bad choices sometimes. Easier not only because of not wanting to admit it to yourself, but also by avoiding having to say or do anything about it.

Easier to blame the existence of a car built to take the punishment of a high speed collision than to realize that she and her husband had done nothing to stop it, that Rick had chosen to race in the morning and to come back in the evening despite being so drunk that day he'd tried to drive off an unfinished bridge and needed his sister to guide him back to the course, that Fina's betrayal of Eddy had led to animosity between them growing so powerful that she had insisted on driving that night, that she had pushed Bumblebee to fight that other car for the lead under threat of the button she knew hurt him rather than take the safer option of hanging back and fighting for the lead on a less dangerous stretch of the road. Sure, blame Bumblebee, not any of the drivers that night, none of the organizers, participants or anyone who'd had a choice. He understood. It was easier. You couldn't hurt a car's feelings. You couldn't offend it. You couldn't make it angry with you. And the car wouldn't even try to argue with you about it. At least, that was the theory.

But Bumblebee was beginning to understand why he had to stay. So long as everyone counted themselves blameless, nothing would change. Bumblebee was willing to admit the part he'd played, and he was staying to try and make it right. But he was not willing to pretend he was the only one who'd had a hand in what had happened. Everyone had done something that led to this, even if that something was nothing. He seemed to be the only one who realized that his actions -or lack thereof- had consequences. If he was the only one involved to realize it, then nothing would change in this family.

They would simply blame him, and then go on with their lives, never stopping to take a hard look at themselves and their choices. He didn't need to stay to be their scapegoat. If he did, then he wouldn't really be taking responsibility at all. He would be being as selfish, careless and indifferent as the rest of them. They did not need his silence. They needed his voice.

While he'd been thinking, the woman had gone rummaging in the garage. Now she returned with a crowbar. Bumblebee watched as she raised it with the intent of smashing his side window.

 _{Do not!}_ Bumblebee shouted, letting rebuke and fury be heard in his voice if not his words, and that was carried forward by the sound of his engine turning over and roaring with him.

The woman fell back in terror, landing on her seat and dropping the bar. Bumblebee was just as astonished. He hadn't had command over his own engine in days. Belatedly, he realized that everything in him had been knocked loose in the wreck – up to and including the control device under the hood. Maybe it had even been rattled loose earlier and he simply hadn't thought to test it.

Bumblebee's engine stuttered out and fell silent, but he wasn't sure if his control was unreliable or if the surprise of having any had broken his concentration. With the woman cowering on the floor, one hand lifted to cover her mouth, he didn't want to try it again. He'd scared her half to death, no need to take her the rest of the way. Her eyes were wide with fear as she stared at him, her face had turned white when she'd fallen back. She was shaking, and seemed too terrified to even scream.

Bumblebee knew it was likely anything he said would only scare her more, no matter how gently he tried to speak. It was much easier to read hostility than any other intent, especially when you assumed that the thing addressing you was hostile. People only heard sounds of peace when they wanted to. Still, he couldn't find it in himself to just remain still and silent.

 _{I'm not trying to scare you,}_ he said quietly, trying to control the harsh buzzing uptick that came at the end of most of his sentences, _{I will not hurt you. But I don't want you to hurt me either, I just-}_

It was then that she screamed.

* * *

"Let me be certain I understand: You left Bumblebee behind?" Ratchet was somewhat less than pleased with Arcee's decision, and he was far from the only one.

"You went out to get him," Raf added, "That's the _only_ reason you went."

"Bumblebee asked me to let him stay," Arcee replied, "He wasn't able to explain why, but I believe it's important to him."

"He said 'please'," Bulkhead put in.

"Oh, he said 'please', did he?" Ratchet scoffed, "Well, I suppose that makes it alright."

"We know where he is now -roughly speaking anyway-, and I fully intend to go back and ask Bee why it's so important that he stay when there isn't a human around," Arcee said, "He may have a perfectly good reason for what he's doing and just not be able to tell us."

"I don't care what his reasons are!" Ratchet erupted, "He was injured in that wreck, and could be further hurt by a lack of medical care. He was in no condition -or position- to make that decision."

"Aw, c'mon, Ratchet," Bulkhead said, "You know better'n any of us what Bee's capable of. It was probably just a scratch, anyway he didn't seem worried about it."

" _He_ isn't a medic," Ratchet retorted.

"Optimus?" Arcee turned to the Prime, who had remained silent up until now, "Did I make the right call or not?"

Optimus was quiet for a moment, then answered, "That, I do not know. But there is no doubt in my mind but that our Scout would overreach his limits if he believed he could make a positive difference. There is no guarantee that he would be cautious with his own life if his concern was for the lives of others."

"What are you thinking, Optimus?" Ratchet asked genuinely, the fierce temper he directed towards the others completely absent when he addressed his leader.

"However he arrived in his present situation, it is obvious that Bumblebee believes he must remain," Optimus said, "It is possible the humans he has been seen with are in some kind of danger. Danger which he thinks he can protect them from on his own, without involving his fellow Autobots."

"And you think he's got enough sense not to get in over his head?" Ratchet inquired patiently.

"I am uncertain," Optimus replied, "But our Scout clearly has information we do not, and I believe he is attempting -to the best of his ability- to do the right thing."

"Be that as it may, Optimus," Ratchet said, "Remember that one of our Scout's attempts to 'do the right thing' landed him in the clutches of Megatron, costing him his voice and nearly his life."

"I have not forgotten," Optimus assured him calmly, "and I am certain that Bumblebee has not forgotten either. But I know also that it is not like him to make the same mistake twice."

* * *

"Are you completely out of your mind!?" the man whom Bumblebee had finally come to know as Larry was pacing agitatedly in front of the Scout, looking just short of tearing his own hair out, "Do you have any idea what you've just done!?"

 _{Do you?}_ Bumblebee returned evenly, but Larry didn't even pretend to try and understand.

"Let me explain something to you about MECH: they believe that knowledge is power. That's why none of us have tried to reveal the existence of your kind, even though we have perfect proof."

Bumblebee let that pass without asking. It wouldn't do any good to ask, even had Larry understood him. Besides, if they could down Bee himself and steal his T-Cog, surely that wasn't the only thing they were capable of. Perhaps he was not their only victim.

"I obtained permission to acquire you under the strict understanding that no one would ever find out what you really are. That's why we chose you, not just any Autobot but the one who can't talk. But now you've gone and done it. Bad enough that Fina thought you were alive, but now you've got Rick and Vera thinking it too. Do you have any idea what MECH will do to me... to you... to both of us!?... if they find out?" here he finally paused for breath, panting slightly in his dismay.

 _{Maybe you should have thought of that before you kidnapped an Autobot.}_

"I thought we had an understanding," Larry sighed finally, "I didn't want to hurt you."

 _{And yet, you installed a button for doing just that. I wonder why I'm having trouble believing you.}_

"This is no time for gloating. You're in trouble. And so am I, if I can't explain to my wife and children why their new car can talk... if you call that talking."

 _{Who's gloating?}_

Larry sighed wearily, pinching the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger, "This is not how I wanted my holiday season to go at all."

 _{You?}_ Bumblebee scoffed, _{Well how do you think I feel about it?}_

This time Larry ignored him. He left the garage, switching off the light when he went.

Once he was gone, probably to come up with some explanation that Vera and/or Rick would believe about what their new car was, Bumblebee took the opportunity to run a test for himself.

He'd started his engine once, maybe he could do it again.

Bumblebee had no intention of leaving, at least not yet, but he wanted his own strength back under his control, especially if -as Larry feared- he was going to be attracting the wrath of MECH.


	17. Wish We Never Met

Bumblebee spent the next two days sitting in the garage, feeling as if he would die from the sheer boredom. Having been held captive before, Bumblebee was familiar with the reality that most of that time was spent having nothing to do but sit there and worry about what might be coming next.

One break in the monotony was when Larry came and tried to pound out the worst of the dents. He also reattached the mangled side mirror. He said nothing, but his expression suggested he felt guilty and was trying to ease his conscience. He didn't know that Bumblebee had been given the opportunity to get away from him, but had chosen to come back. It was probably for the best that Rick hadn't told him.

The only other change from the norm was Rick, who came out the first day with the clear intention of driving away in the Jag, but then stopped like he suddenly couldn't remember why he'd come out to the garage. Eventually, Rick was sitting on the concrete floor, leaning against Bumblebee's left front fender and playing with his keys, while quietly relating aloud everything that had been the result of that fateful and ill-advised race.

The other driver would live, but his spine had been broken in the crash; he might never walk again. All of the drivers from that night were in trouble with the police for illegal street racing, as were several others, including Tracy, who was apparently mad at Rick for having ducked out. Rick seem to know them all by name, and Bumblebee gradually realized that all of Rick's friends were in trouble, but he wasn't because he hadn't been there when the cops arrived and nobody had offered his name. Rick was experiencing a variation of survivor's guilt. His friends weren't dead, but they had all been caught and -if not for his sister's demand that he get Bumblebee off the track- he would have been too.

"I should have been driving that night," Rick said at one point, "It should have been me, not Fina."

Humans tended to act like feeling guilty was a bad thing, with only negative results. But, as Rick talked to him that day, Bumblebee saw a side of the boy that had heretofore been hidden beneath layers of arrogance and selfishness. Beneath everything, Rick cared about his sister... and his friends, instead of caring only about what they could do for him. Right now, none of them could do anything for him, and being associated with them would land him in trouble, though how much trouble he couldn't know. Yet, whether he knew it or not, it was obvious Rick would rather be with them than here.

Rick sat for a long time, talking more to himself than to Bee, fiddling with the keys for the Jaguar. Then, finally, he said he was going to visit Fina in the hospital. He stood up, got in the Jag, and drove away. He didn't get back until late in the evening. He had been drinking. He made it out of the Jag, weaved uncertainly and then collapsed against Bumblebee.

"Can't go in the house like this," he muttered aloud, and then climbed through Bee's lowered side window and worked his way into the backseat, where he promptly fell asleep.

It was about three or four in the morning when Rick awakened, sobered enough to get into the house without attracting the notice of anyone who might be awake. He was back again before sunrise.

"I'll be back soon," he told Bumblebee, patting the Cybertronian on the hood as he went to the Jag.

While Rick was gone, Larry returned to the garage and worked out most of the lesser dents along Bumblebee's sides, and tried to straighten out his warped front bumper. Despite the number of times he'd been flipped recently, Bumblebee's hood and top were largely intact; his armor plating was strongest at these points and had protected him from serious harm. Larry had gone back to the house by the time Rick got back, and Bee knew it was unlikely either was aware the other was visiting the garage frequently. Unless they were avoiding each other for some reason.

Rick had barely parked the Jag, backwards and crooked in the garage, when he got out carrying something heavy, which he shortly deposited on the ground near Bumblebee. It was a paint can.

 _{You're serious?}_ Bumblebee asked, unable to fully keep the scorn out of his voice.

Regular paint that you could find in a hardware store didn't cut it for Cybertronians. Between being shot at and the way their moving parts brushed against each other (particularly during transformation), any regular paint would be scratched clean off in no time. Bumblebee had been somewhat in need of a paint-job for a long time, all of the Autobots were. But they all looked passably well-kept in vehicle mode, so no one would take much notice of the myriad small scratches that adorned their surface. The Autobots didn't have time for paint. Even if they did, hardware store paint wasn't going to work well for them and would be a waste of precious time and resources.

Beyond that, Bumblebee had been dented and mangled by the two races, a ruined paint-job seemed like it was the most trivial somehow. Fina had been accused of obsessing over appearances. Evidently she was not the only one, if Rick was concerned with paint at a time like this.

"Oh don't worry, this isn't all I've got," Rick said, misinterpreting Bumblebee's noise of disgust, "I've got another few quarts of the stuff, paint rollers, touch up brushes, a dust mask, all the stuff I need. This isn't the first time I've painted a car. Trust me, this'll look great when I'm done."

 _{Sure, but what about the next time I transform?}_ Bumblebee muttered.

"Look," Rick said, going back to the Jag and pulling out another can, holding this one up as if he thought that would help Bee see it better, "Yellow with black, just like before. Trust me."

Bumblebee didn't like to think of himself as vain, but he couldn't help the twinge of relief at hearing Rick wouldn't be trying to change his colors. Not that he expected the paint to last, and not that it was really important, but Bumblebee was rather fond of his looks. Hell, how he looked was the only thing of his former life on Cybertron that he had left.

The war had been desperate, even in Bumblebee's youth, and so he had never been allowed the time to aspire to anything but becoming an Autobot because by then there was nothing left but the two warring sides; and Bumblebee could not be a Decepticon, even though they promised more time for personal pursuits because nearly everyone in that army had an ego the size of a planet and more than a little selfish concern with his own interests. Decepticons tried to buy recruits with the promise of power, glory, and the ability to make or do anything that they willed because they would have their own corner to rule in the name of Lord Megatron. But Bee hadn't been interested, because he could see that what sounded like the freedom to do whatever he wanted came with too high a price tag, and that freedom would be false because he would always be under the absolute control of Megatron, who would allow only certain types of personal pursuit, and then only when it did not interfere with his own plans and desires. Freedom with a bit and reins was not freedom at all.

And so Bumblebee had joined the Autobot cause. Bumblebee would, for as long as he served, follow the orders of his superiors. He would be a soldier, and the war would allow him little personal time. The Autobots could not make promises about the society which would follow if they defeated Megatron, because they did not intend to become rulers in his place. Their sales pitch wasn't as inviting except for one detail: they were honest, and as a result he trusted them.

The long and the short of all that was that, when Cybertron had gasped its last breath and the war had come to Earth, the Autobots had been left with nothing. Not only their home was destroyed or lost, but almost everything they had. Bumblebee's attachment to his coloration was less about vanity, and more about clinging to one of the only things he had left that was still _him_ , that hadn't been consumed by the fires of war.

"Look, I get that this doesn't make up for my being an ass, but it's something I know how to do," Rick said, "And besides, it's something that will matter to Fina when she comes home."

Appearances mattered to Fina. And Fina, as had only recently become apparent to Bee, mattered to Rick.

As Rick circled Bumblebee, evidently figuring how and where he'd like to start, he suddenly frowned and stepped closer. He put a hand on the side mirror, running his fingers along the line of the repaired break. Then he stood back and looked Bee over again, realization coming to his eyes. He wasn't the only one working on repairs here. That seemed to surprise him.

"He gave you to us," Rick said quietly, "What does Dad care what happens to you now?"

 _{Maybe he knows what he's done is wrong,}_ Bumblebee suggested.

"Man, I wish I had a clue what you were saying," Rick said, "I mean, after hearing that lady on the motorcycle respond to you, it's obvious you're not just making noise, you're really talking. I just... have no idea what you're saying."

 _{Most people don't,}_ Bumblebee told him mildly.

"And yet, you keep on talking," Rick remarked, "Which seems like a wasted effort."

 _{So are most of the things you say, but you don't see me stopping you from babbling endlessly.}_

"If you're hoping that I'll figure out how to understand you if you just keep talking, don't bother. I'm not that smart."

 _{Finally. Something we agree on.}_

Rick shrugged and set to work. It was soon apparent that he had not been merely boasting; the boy could actually paint. Somehow that surprised Bee. He wouldn't have expected the spoiled and bratty rich kid to be able or willing to do anything akin to hard work, and painting a car certainly qualified. Painting a car by hand was a lengthy, multi-step, labor intensive project; one where mistakes were easy to make and could be difficult or impossible to cover up once made.

Even though Rick was using the same colors, Bumblebee's paint had taken such a beating that this was hardly a touch up job, more like completely starting over – especially the way humans did it.

Rick didn't talk while he worked, wearing the dust mask to protect himself from the fumes and dust he generated while working would have made it virtually impossible anyway. Bumblebee wondered if he was thinking and -if so- what about.

Rick left late at night. In the morning, he came back, but not to continue the work. While he'd been working, he'd taken the other cars in the garage out of it, and put up protective plastic to keep the bits of paint and such off the other surfaces in the garage. The air had cleared overnight, and Rick returned the SUV to its spot, leaving in the Jag. The paint-job was far from finished, but it seemed that Rick had something more important to do today than work.

When he got back, it was evident that what he'd had to do was go and get Fina from the hospital. Bee wondered what Larry and Vera were doing that made them unavailable. He knew they hadn't left, because the SUV was still here, and it was the only vehicle on the property besides Bee and the Jag.

When Fina got out of the passenger side, Bumblebee felt the crumbling of his anxiety about her as relief flooded in at the sight of her able to get out of the car on her own and walk. She had stitches in the side of her forehead, her right arm was in a sling, and she moved gingerly, but she was alive, she could walk, and she was well enough to come home. It could have been much worse.

Rick offered to help her towards the house, but she shrugged him off and turned instead to the garage. She looked at Bumblebee, and her jaw set, he could see the muscles tightening under her skin.

"You," she said, and there was no mistaking her anger as she spat through her teeth, "Of _course_ you're here. This is your fault. You did this to me."

The words stung, because Bumblebee believed them. He had felt nothing of the accusations of Larry or Rick, because he knew that they were just looking for someone else to blame. But the anger and hurt in Fina's bright eyes could not be denied. He was guilty. If he hadn't chosen his desire to race over his duty to keep humans out of harm's way, Fina would not have been hospitalized.

"I wish I'd never laid eyes on you," Fina said, "I wish we had never met."

He saw in her eyes what she did not say: _I wish you were dead_.


	18. Soul Turns

Rick spent most of the day working on Bee's paint. Fina remained in the house. Rick explained that her license had been suspended, and their parents had to pay a fine. She was a minor, so that counted, but she was also a repeat offender, with a list of minor offenses like speeding and not stopping for lights and so on that was longer than a calendar year and that -naturally- counted against her.

"She's just upset," Rick assured Bee, before he began work for the day, "When she calms down, you'll see. She's not really mad at you. She's mad at herself for getting caught."

While Rick worked in silence, the dust mask covering his face, Bumblebee wondered if the boy really understood what he had just said. Blaming others for their mistakes seemed to be a family trait. But, unlike what everyone else had said, Bee found himself believing Fina.

Intellectually, he knew that he was no more responsible than anybody else, that he could not have known what would happen on that hill. It was entirely possible that Rick and Fina would not have given him a choice had he wanted to refuse to enter the race. But the thing was... he hadn't even tried.

And what did he think he was doing by staying here anyway? He was helpless and useless. The Autobots needed their Scout, they needed every soldier they could muster because they had precious few. And yet, Bumblebee was here, trying to sort out teen angst and bad parenting. Somehow, even though he had chosen to do this, it was hard to believe it was the right decision. At the time, it had seemed like the only thing to do. But now it seemed like he was just sitting in a garage, doing nothing, while the world spun on without him.

In the afternoon, Rick took a break for lunch. When he came back, he surveyed the work he'd done, and seemed a little discouraged by the size of the task still ahead of him. While he was still standing there, just looking at Bee, Larry came out to the garage. Rick didn't notice as his father stood and looked at him with the same assessing eye Rick was applying to Bumblebee. It would take a lot of effort, time and care to fix this. Larry seemed to have an idea about what the first step would be, because he moved to his son's side and stood until Rick noticed him before speaking.

"Could you use an extra hand?"

If he was hoping for instant welcome, he was disappointed, because Rick merely shrugged and said "Whatever. There's an extra dust mask in the bag over there."

They spent the afternoon on the same project, but they obviously weren't working together on it. Rick stayed on one side of Bee, while Larry remained on the other. It also rapidly became obvious that Rick had spent far more time painting cars than his father ever had. Larry's work was slow and somewhat haphazard, and it was clear his heart was less in the painting than trying to connect with his son on some level. Though they lived in the same house, it was clear that Larry had stopped being a real father long ago, assuming he'd ever been such a thing in the first place.

The winter evening dove in swiftly. The sun set early, and the blackness of the night crept in. Today Rick had covered the other vehicles with protective tarp, but left the garage open. Because they were using the garage lights to see, neither Rick nor Larry seemed to notice when it got dark outside. They couldn't see the stars come out, because their artificial light sources blinded them to the night sky. Bumblebee saw the stars though, and -somehow- he felt closer to home than before.

Rick and Larry eventually took a break. Bumblebee thought they were probably done for the day, that they'd go in for dinner or something. But Rick surveyed Larry's work and shook his head.

"No," he said, "We're not done 'til we fix that. I'm not leaving that."

"Fix what?" Larry asked, "I didn't miss a spot, did I?"

"No, but that's going to dry all wrong," he walked around in front of Bee to look at his own handiwork, "See? Look at my side. And now look at yours. See the difference?"

"Well," Larry said slowly, "I don't know how to do that."

"Then I'll show you," Rick replied, "And we'll fix it together."

Bumblebee had assumed Larry didn't know how to paint a car. But once he and Rick started working together, a new thought made itself felt. Maybe Larry had done it on purpose, hoping for just this result. True, it was still just painting a car but -for perhaps the first time ever- father and son were working side by side. They were working together to make something better.

That meant something, and Bumblebee suddenly realized he was glad that he could be a part of it.

* * *

Raf was not satisfied with the Autobots' acceptance of leaving Bumblebee somewhere alone, without knowing exactly where he was, or what was happening to him.

Bumblebee had described enough of his adventures as a Scout on Cybertron that Raf knew sometimes he didn't have the time to explain himself, or couldn't explain himself in front of everyone present and so had to either lie or try to excuse himself without explanation. Maybe this was one of those times, but Raf was not willing to let go so easily.

The Autobots were smart, and they were powerful, but they too easily underestimated the abilities of humans and overestimated their own safety in the presence of hostile humans. Jack, Miko and Raf had put a dent in their unintentional arrogance by proving more valuable than the Autobots had ever imagined they could be, and MECH had taken another swipe at them by proving that the organization could take a Cybertronian by surprise and fell them. The Autobots were learning the potential of humans as allies and enemies, but they didn't understand humanity as Raf did.

There was just something not right about the fact that Bee had gone missing, only to turn up again miles from where he'd disappeared without any trace or explanation in the hands of strangers.

Bumblebee might be in trouble and not even know it. Or he could be in trouble and unable to express it for some reason. The Autobots viewed Bumblebee as a Scout, a soldier. But Raf couldn't bring himself to do that. Though his trust and faith in Bumblebee was unequaled, still Raf could only see Bumblebee as his friend. His guardian, yes, but most of all his friend. And, because they were friends, Raf knew that Bumblebee was not always as strong, fearless or self sufficient as he might pretend to be.

Sometimes the brave Scout needed help, even if he didn't ask for it.

Raf wasn't sure what he could do at first, so he kept looking for sightings of Bumblebee, restricted now to the area where he'd been racing. There was no evidence of his presence, though the news website for that area ran more than one story about the plague of illegal street racing, which seemed to be a favorite pastime of the local high school students, and included mention that a group of them had been rounded up in recent days, their fate -legally speaking- not yet decided. Their names were understandably withheld, though some of the cars they'd driven were pictured with their license plates blurred. Because the authorities didn't know about the racing website, they didn't know that the winning car from the morning's race was missing, but they did know that a second car must have been involved in the wreck that resulted in their being called; a car that had been removed from the scene. Breaking into the local police server, Raf found that they had evidence to suggest the car might have been yellow because of paint bits left on the guardrail. Matching paint was found on the other vehicle involved, but it has clearly been bashed by so many cars of so many colors recently that it was impossible to say which was the last, and it was possible that the paint on the rail had merely come off of this car.

Raf knew that Agent Fowler would be notified if the police seemed to be coming to any conclusions. Ratchet would keep an eye on that, among his other duties, and message Fowler to warn him that the detectives in that area needed to be stopped or misdirected, whichever was most effective. Just now, those detectives didn't appear to have anything worth trying to cover up. To interfere with the investigation now would raise more eyebrows than just letting it run its course. In all likelihood, the detectives would hit a dead end and eventually give up hope of finding the missing vehicle.

Chances were, Bee was now lying low because being seen on the street would give him away. Not because he was a yellow vehicle, but because he looked just like the other cars to have participated in the race, only a little less beat up. The scrapes and dents Raf had seen on camera would be a dead giveaway. Bee would have to avoid notice or conduct some serious personal maintenance before showing up on the street again. Raf didn't know how long that would take, so he kept looking.

He was so focused on the places he was monitoring that he at first ignored the pinging notification of one of the programs he'd set up early on to monitor social media. But when he continued to find nothing, he finally took a break and checked the other program windows. What he found was a picture posted to a social media site, a picture that was unmistakably Bumblebee before he had raced. The header read "Have you seen this car?" and under the post was a story.

The poster's father had apparently gifted the car to her and her brother, and she was trying to find out where it had come from. She only hinted that the car was something other than it appeared, enough that anyone who actually knew about the car would recognize what she meant whereas nobody else would have a clue. She'd been surprisingly careful in her choices of words describing the car. Going to her online profile, Raf found the girl was a teenager from the same area as the race, and that she had later posted "About the car. Never mind, I found out what I wanted to know", which Raf's program had missed because it was looking only for pictures which resembled Bee.

She hadn't posted her location publicly, but it wasn't hard for Raf to track her down. Now he had an address where he was pretty sure Bumblebee could be found. Only he wasn't certain what to do with it. After all, the Autobots seemed singularly uninterested in getting Bee back right now, or even going to talk to him and find out what he was actually doing.

Then he remembered that Ratchet had seemed less willing to let it go than the others. He had bowed to Optimus' wishes, but hadn't there still been reluctance in his gaze? Uncertainty? Raf knew that Ratchet had never let go of his guilt at not being able to make Bumblebee good as new when his voice box was crushed, and so he worried about the Scout perhaps more than the others did. His memory would never allow him to forget the sight of a broken Scout, tortured by Megatron and then left to die.

He went to Ratchet and reported what he'd found, then said, "I want to go and talk to this girl."

"No," was Ratchet's flat-toned answer.

"Why not? She's just a kid, barely older than Jack, if that. She wouldn't be any danger to me, and she might know where Bee is, what he's doing... why he hasn't come home."

Ratchet was silent, evidently searching for a way to explain to Raf why he couldn't go.

"Ratchet, please," Raf pleaded, "This is Bumblebee. We can't just stand by and do nothing."

"Optimus would never approve of my sending you alone," Ratchet said, shaking his head.

"Ratchet, this is about Bee. He's my friend. I know you understand that I have to make sure he's okay. You understood once before, remember?"

Ratchet sighed heavily, "Of course. Alright. But you will not go alone. I will go with you."

Raf smiled, and nodded his agreement.


	19. No Gift to Bring

Late that night, long after Rick had gone to bed, Larry returned with a lawn chair and a beer. The garage was closed now, and its heater was running. Larry sat his chair in a fraction of the space left by the SUV, in full view of Bumblebee's side mirror. Though he opened the beer, Larry didn't take a sip from it, he just sat and held it for awhile. Minutes passed before he moved or spoke.

"I'm sorry," he said finally, turning to avoid looking right at Bee, "I shouldn't have yelled at you. You don't know MECH like I do, and couldn't have understood the danger you were putting my family in by revealing any part of what you are to them. I'd say you were only trying to protect yourself, but I guess we both know that most of what you've done these past few days had nothing to do with helping yourself. From what Rick and Fina have said, I know you did what you could to protect them. Not that I'm not grateful -I am, more than you could ever know- but what I don't get is why."

Bumblebee made no attempt to speak to the man, he wouldn't have understood it anyway, not even if Bee had spoken in English.

"I wish I could let you go," Larry paused, staring at the label on his beer bottle, "Actually, I almost wish I'd never gotten hold of you in the first place. Except that, thinking about what would've happened to Rick on that bridge, or Fina in the race, if you hadn't been there... I can't be sorry. Because, if not for you, I think one or both of my kids would be dead now. And it's because of you that I finally have the opportunity to make a difference in Rick's life again. You don't know what it's been like. Before this, he and I would never have done a project together. Hell, he barely even spoke to me on a good day."

Larry leaned down and set the beer on the concrete floor. He straightened, still sitting so that he wasn't looking at Bumblebee, but at the closed garage door ahead of him instead.

"It would take all night to recount the mistakes I've made," Larry said, "And a lifetime to tell what a fool I've been all these years. I'd given up any hope of being able to get my kids to listen to me. And excused myself by saying they were teenagers. And teenagers never listen to their parents anyway, and always make stupid, dangerous decisions that can ruin their lives forever. I'm guilty of apathy about the fate of my own children. Of worrying more about not doing any harm to their independence or curtailing their personal sense of freedom than I was about what actually happened to them. No, it's worse than that."

Larry picked up the beer, but still didn't drink from it, "I was so afraid of them not liking me that I lost their respect in the process. I was worried about how they felt about me, instead of who they were becoming. What kind of parent does that? What kind of person thinks about themselves and how people feel about them before they consider the consequences to others?" he put the beer down again.

Despite the fact that he was able, Bumblebee didn't so much as twitch his mirror in response. Not out of fear of what Larry might do to him, but concern that the man was taking a good, hard look at himself and would pounce on any chance of distracting himself from having to see what he didn't want to. The truth about what he'd done, and who he'd allowed himself to become.

Many people excused themselves by saying that they hadn't done anything, which worked so long as they didn't hold up a mirror and realize that inaction was sometimes more disastrous and damaging in the end than any action could have been. Because they had done nothing, they counted themselves guiltless. But Larry was looking at himself, and seeing what doing nothing had caused.

Bumblebee knew the consequences of inaction only too well. When Megatron had first turned to darkness, those around him had refused to see it, had done nothing. Perhaps nothing could have prevented Megatron's descent, but certainly someone could have stopped him from rising to power if only they hadn't told themselves it was none of their business what he said or did.

It was always easy to say it took two to make an argument, but when that argument was over freedom or tyranny, life or destruction, it was no longer reasonable to stay out of it. A part of friendship and family was tolerance for personal opinions, likes and dislikes, that was true. But the hard part, the part most people didn't want to see, was that this gift of friendship came with responsibility. A responsibility to tell your friend or family member if they were straying from the light and into darkness. And that was never easy, particularly for humans, whose emotions tended to run high and color their perception until they became aggressive and hurtful on both sides. The risk was driving the person further into darkness with a wrong word, or breaking the relationship beyond repair. But doing nothing could do something far worse if they lost their life or soul by your silence.

How many wars could have been stopped before they started? How much murder and mayhem could have been prevented? How much of the sorrow in the universe could have been avoided by friends and family members being brave enough to risk their place in the heart of someone they loved by telling them the truth about the path they were on? By not turning a blind eye to the things which were done to others and those around them? By offering forgiveness for wrongs done rather than pretending those things had not happened in the first place?

Bumblebee certainly didn't know, and he knew his own judgment was often bad when it came to deciding whether he should intervene or be silent and let those close to him figure out for themselves what they believed in and who they would choose to be. He knew better than anyone that words were often overrated. Sometimes silence did what words never could. But how was one to know when was the time for silence and when was the time to speak out?

"I can't let you go," Larry said after a lengthy pause, "For a lot of reasons. Not the least of which is that, for the first time in years... maybe ever... Rick and I are working on something together. More importantly, how would I explain to MECH that I 'lost' an Autobot I was supposed to have complete control over? Do you have any idea what they would do to me, to my family, if they thought I just... let you go?"

His tone had changed, and Bumblebee could hear he was now trying to justify his actions to himself again. In truth, Bee didn't know what MECH would do, but he assumed it would be bad. However selfish Larry's other reasons might be, Bee could understand and accept the desire for self preservation, and for protecting his family who -while not innocent in a lot of ways- had no part in Bee's being here in the first place and so should not have to suffer for something Larry had done.

Larry stood up, hesitated, then patted Bee, "I'm sorry. I don't know what else I can do from here."

Then he left, turning off the light and leaving both the beer and the lawn chair behind.

Bumblebee sat still in the dark, wishing that he could point out to Larry that he himself had done many things when he was supposedly rendered helpless, unable to so much as control his own four wheels. You could _always_ do something. And, as an Autobot, if that something helped someone else, especially trying to save a human life, Bumblebee had felt obligated to at least try.

Just being scared was no excuse for not at least trying to do the right thing.

* * *

The location of the poster Raf had tracked down was a surprise to both Raf and Ratchet. The property was just a couple of acres, most of which were taken up by the rise and fall of the land. The driveway swept steeply downward to a concrete area in front of an enormous garage. The land swept upward from there and also from the edge of the road to place the house on a smallish hill. House, it was a mansion. Raf had never seen a private home so large, it looked big enough to be a hotel. Stone steps led upwards from the side of the garage and concrete apron up to the covered porch.

On the apron were two expensive vehicles. The SUV was almost as large as Bulkhead in his vehicle mode, a big black monster of a car. Beside it, almost incongruous in the night, sat a sleek silver Jaguar. Both looked out of place in front of such a large garage rather than inside it in the deep, snow drenched night. But they looked even stranger taken together because the only thing they had in common was the tremendous expense one would have to go to in order to acquire either one of them.

The night was late, but the brilliant moon and clear sky reflected off the snow to make it seem almost as bright as day, revealing that the mansion lights were all out, as one would expect at this hour.

After quietly circling the block a few times, Ratchet gingerly descended the steep driveway, his wheels slipping slightly on the iced concrete, making Raf wonder how anyone could get in and out. He supposed that might be what the SUV was for; it looked capable of driving over anything.

The boy and the Autobot did not have to talk it over to guess that Bumblebee might be in the closed garage. While Ratchet sat waiting, Raf climbed out and ran around to the side door. To his surprise and relief, someone had left it unlocked. He checked over his shoulder, feeling suddenly like the trespasser he was. He quickly shrugged it off. He wasn't breaking and entering, he was trying to find his kidnapped friend. If anyone wanted to punish him for that, he would accept it.

The dark garage felt very open and airy and -for a moment- empty. As Raf's eyes adjusted to the dimness, using the light from the moon that streamed through the windows on the garage door, he spotted what he momentarily took to be another expensive car. But the sense that tells you when you walk into an empty room told him that there was a presence here, and he knew who it was.

"Bumblebee!" he stage whispered, nervous as his call was followed by a lengthy silence, thinking perhaps he was mistaken after all.

But Bumblebee it was, and he responded with surprise and evident distress, _{Raf? Raf, what are you doing here? How did you get here? Is anyone with you? You shouldn't be here!}_

"Easy, Bee, easy," Raf hurried across the garage, almost tripping over a paint can lid in his rush to get to Bee's side, "It's okay. I'm here with Ratchet."

He touched a hand to Bumblebee's side door briefly, and was reassured by the warmth he felt beneath the cold metal, which he realized not everyone could feel, but knew was the pulse of life concealed beneath the vehicular disguise. He knew that, despite his obvious agitation, Bumblebee was not unhappy to see him, for the presence he sensed was welcoming and familiar.

"Hang on a sec', while I get the garage door open to let Ratchet in," Raf said, patting Bee once before moving away to try and find the controls for the garage door.

The garage door wasn't hard to figure out. Less than a minute later, Ratchet had entered the garage and Raf had closed it. Bumblebee's side mirror twitched in acknowledgment of Ratchet when he entered, but otherwise the Scout didn't move.

"I expected to find you in worse shape," Ratchet remarked dryly.

 _{You shouldn't be here,}_ Bumblebee replied, his intonation that of a subordinate issuing warning, rather than an equal or superior offering a rebuke.

"Neither should you," Raf said, "Bee, you can leave. Why stay here?"

 _{It's complicated,}_ Bee told him.

"We have time," Ratchet replied.

"All night," Raf put in.

Bumblebee sighed, and began at the beginning.


	20. Did You Know

"Bee..." Raf was shaking his head slowly, "You don't owe these people anything. They hurt you on purpose. They're mean to each other, and to you and everybody around them."

 _{And my inaction hurt them,}_ Bumblebee said, though everything Raf said was true.

"That wasn't your fault," Raf told him, "You can't fix people who don't know they're broken."

There was a painful awareness in the boy's voice, and Bumblebee knew its cause. Though Raf's family clearly loved him, the boy often felt ignored and even unwanted because there were so many of them and they were so loud and sometimes seemed to forget him. He could do nothing to change his family, and had learned to measure his worth by means other than their attentions. Bumblebee knew he had played no small part in making Raf feel wanted and valuable, simply because he loved the boy as he did, and because he had learned much in his life about expressions of affection, and telling people how much you cared for them while you had the chance in whatever way they understood. Young in terms of his own kind, Bumblebee had already outlived any human on Earth, and in the many years of his existence he had come to understand that one must never take the people or things they love for granted, for those things are too easily, often and swiftly lost.

Raf was wise beyond his years, but he was nonetheless young, even for his kind. Bumblebee wasn't sure how to make him understand, partially because here was a place where logic was inadequate and could not explain his reasons. He simply knew that this was something he must do. And then he realized that was something Raf _would_ understand, even if Ratchet did not.

 _{Raf,}_ he spoke softly, pausing as the boy -who had sunk to a sitting position, leaning against one of his tires- looked up at him, _{I must stay. I have to make this right.}_

"But you didn't make it wrong to begin with," Raf protested.

"Rafael is correct," Ratchet said, "You did not start this."

 _{But I am part of it now,}_ Bumblebee replied, _{I can't just leave. They need me.}_

"As do we," Ratchet reminded him, an undercurrent of harshness belying his gentle tone, "Or have you forgotten that we are in a war, that the numbers are already against us, and that Earth itself will be the price if we lose?"

 _{I haven't forgotten,}_ Bumblebee said quietly, stung by the implication that he could ever forget that he was a soldier in the Autobot army, that he might ever forget that the fate of Cybertron might one day also be the fate of Earth if the war was lost.

"It certainly sounds as if you have," Ratchet pressed.

Ratchet's words hurt, primarily because Bumblebee understood why he was saying that. Had their roles been reversed, it was entirely possible he might have said the same thing. The Autobots needed their Scout, not because he was so special, but because they were so few. They could afford to lose no one. The fate of the world was at stake, and Bumblebee was risking it for a man who had kidnapped him, and the family who had used and abused him. There was no logic Bumblebee could apply which would make his actions make sense. And yet, he remained firm in his conviction.

 _{I don't expect you to understand,}_ Bumblebee said, _{But I have to stay. I just know this is something I must do. Can you understand that?}_

It did not surprise him that Ratchet's silence was negative. But Raf did surprise him.

"I think I do," Raf replied, "And, if you think you've got to stay, then there's something I need to do."

 _{What's that?}_ Bumblebee inquired.

"I need to talk to this Fina person. She needs to understand what you're giving up for her."

 _{Raf, you can't-}_ Bumblebee protested as Ratchet said, "We are robots in disguise, humans can't-"

"I understand," Raf said, "But she doesn't. And I think she needs to. You have to let me do this. Please."

He looked not to Ratchet, but to Bumblebee, for Bumblebee was his guardian and the one he had to convince. In the boy's eyes, Bumblebee saw the conviction he himself felt. He knew he could not deny Raf this request and still demand that his own be honored.

 _{I don't understand... but I will not stand in your way,}_ Bumblebee said.

Raf nodded, then turned to Ratchet, "It's time we went home. You'll need to 'Bridge me back here in the morning so I can talk to her once she wakes up."

"I do not approve of this course of action," Ratchet said, but did not argue further.

Bumblebee knew that Ratchet would respect Raf's decision for the same reason the old medic was respecting Bumblebee's own. Ratchet was experienced, and he had heard this tone of voice before. He knew that both Scout and boy would do what they felt they must, no matter what. He might as well help them, because they would do this anyway, regardless of what he said or did.

* * *

Ratchet had asked Raf what good he thought he could do by talking to Fina before sending the boy home for the night, but Raf did not answer him. This was mainly because he had no answer. He couldn't imagine what he might say to this girl, a stranger to him, that would make her understand. More, he didn't know what he could say or do that would make her care when it seemed that all she cared about was herself. What he did know was that Bumblebee was staying for her, because he felt guilty about her. And, perhaps because he was so young himself and saw the world through the eyes of the innocent, Raf could understand why Bumblebee would choose this course, even though logic dictated that he should return to the ranks of the Autobots instead.

But Raf also knew that Autobots had a rather over-developed sense of personal responsibility, and would blame themselves for things in which they had taken no part. Even now, despite everything, it was ever clear that Optimus would prefer to save Megatron than defeat him. The Autobot leader was resigned to the reality that he could not, but it obviously weighed on him.

Perhaps that was what truly made Autobots more advanced than men. Not their technology, but their devotion to duty, their capacity for trust, and their willingness to take responsibility for the safety and welfare of everyone around them, both individually and collectively.

As he stepped through the Bridge the next morning to go to speak to Fina, Raf finally knew what he was going to say. He'd figured out what it was that she needed to know.

Ratchet had placed him inside the house, in an empty room, so as to avoid attracting outside attention. There was another reason for doing it that way. Raf wasn't sure these people would let him in if he simply knocked on the door. Because of what they'd done to Bee, he didn't feel the least bit guilty about entering their house in this manner, even if it scared the bejeezus out of them.

Far as he was concerned, they deserved it.

Still, Raf had the decency to at least knock on Fina's bedroom door.

It seemed to take forever for her to open the door. When she finally did, she looked nothing like Raf had expected. Somehow, he had expected someone sharp eyed, sharp chinned and sharp voiced. But, though her eyes were red rimmed and watery, there was nothing in her dark eyes to suggest the nasty person Raf had heard Bumblebee try to describe delicately. Her dark hair with its green tips was a ratted mess about her face, strands of it almost concealing the stitches on her forehead. Her brow furrowed as she stared at Raf, clearly trying to remember if she'd seen him before.

"I'm here to talk to you about Bumblebee," Raf said simply.

"Um... what?" it was clear from her blank expression that she didn't know Bee by name.

"The yellow car. The one you drove in a race recently. The one your dad stole."

"Uh-huh," Fina nodded slowly, leaning against the door-jamb with her good shoulder, "And I suppose that you're the rightful owner. You, who are all of... seven years old?"

"Twelve and a half, actually," Raf corrected her, "And no, I don't _own_ him. Nobody does," he sighed, trying to gather his patience, "And nobody should, either."

"And you know this because...?" she challenged, still blocking the door.

"Because I know him. Bumblebee is my friend. And he'd be yours too, if you'd let him."

For a moment, she looked down at him as if she would challenge him again, or demand that he leave immediately. But then she merely stepped to the side and pushed her door the rest of the way open.

Nervous now, trying not to show it, Raf walked into her room and tried not to flinch as the door clicked shut behind him. He'd faced Decepticons, how scary could a teenage girl be? But this time it was different. This time, what he said really mattered. For the first time, he had to try and get someone else to see Bumblebee the way he saw the Autobot Scout. It wouldn't be easy.

"Move the clothes out of the chair and take a seat," Fina instructed, gesturing to a chair with a leaning tower of apparel items on it and sitting at her desk.

The clothing tower was almost as tall as Raf himself, but he managed to transfer it to the bed with minimal struggle and climbed into the empty chair, then sat facing Fina in silence for a time. He'd known what to say before he came, but now his mind seemed emptied of thoughts and he was only scared. He didn't know what to say, and Fina did not appear inclined to initiate the conversation.

Finally, Raf took a deep breath, reminding himself who this was for, and how important it was.

"When I first met Bumblebee," Raf began, his voice a bit shaky, "he was in the middle of fighting for his life, and the life of his friend," or maybe his sister, Raf had never been clear on that.

Raf saw no reason to mention that Bumblebee had been in robot mode at the time, or that his friend was also a Cybertronian, or that another boy had been there as well. It didn't seem relevant to try and explain the dynamics of Autobots and Decepticons, or that they were from another world and that only a handful of people knew of them or anything. Raf had known next to nothing that day, yet had understood all he needed to in just a few seconds of contact. He had eyes to see with, and ears to hear with, and he had understood from the start that Bumblebee was gentle and friendly and caring. It had been obvious, even in the midst of battle with a pair of vehicons.

Even now, Raf could clearly picture in his mind's eye the sight of Bumblebee coming to the defense of Arcee when the vehicons had knocked her down. He'd come down on them with ferocity and determination, but it had been in defense of Arcee, and the two humans with her. Raf had not known immediately that Bee was aware of his presence, but it had soon become clear.

"He was outnumbered, but that didn't faze him," Raf said.

"I don't imagine it would," Fina said, when Raf paused to think about whether he needed to clarify or not; he decided that he probably didn't, since she seemed to get it.

"In the middle of this huge fight, he accidentally crushed my toy race-car. I didn't know he'd seen me, or even knew I existed. But he stopped, right there, and he apologized. He said he was sorry that he broke it. I'm not even sure he knew what it was, or how he knew it was mine. But he did."

It was only there for an instant, but he saw the flicker in her eyes. She might later deny it, but in that moment she grasped what Raf was trying to tell her about Bumblebee. It wasn't a happy look, but a pained one, because inevitably she found herself thinking of what she probably would have done, and knowing that she would not have noticed Raf, or his toy car, and she certainly would not have been sorry for breaking it nor was there the slightest chance she would have apologized.

"He let himself be distracted. By me," Raf said, and felt the chill inside that always came when he realized that Bee could have been killed then and there, and that he might never have had the chance to come to know the brave Scout as he did now, "and he almost got killed for it."

Fina seemed to avoid looking at Raf then. She feigned being distracted by something on the screen of her computer on the desk, but the monitor was turned off and there was nothing to see. Raf didn't call her on it, even though he caught the look of shame on her face as she turned away. He didn't know what she felt ashamed of, but Bumblebee had told him enough to let him guess. He also guessed that Bumblebee had omitted a few details, particularly when it came to just what sort of people these were. But what he had included was more than enough for Raf to have developed an opinion of them.

"They knocked him down. They would have killed them... but then they noticed me," again, he did not mention Jack. He also didn't mention what he'd done that got their attention, "One of them came after me. I ran away."

"Of course," Fina muttered, but Raf ignored her.

"It -he- would have caught me, and killed me. Maybe to protect the secret of their existence, but more likely just because he could. Bumblebee stopped him. And then he told me to run, to get to safety," Raf paused here, but Fina said nothing, so he continued, "I just happened to be there, but Bumblebee knew that his enemies would not see it that way. They'd be coming after me next. So he made a decision."

Raf knew it had been at least partially Optimus' call, but Fina didn't need to know, and it didn't matter. Even had Optimus not made it an order, Bumblebee would have made the choice anyway. Assuming he thought it through enough to realize that Raf was still in danger. Raf didn't know if Bee would have done that on his own. Bumblebee was smart, Raf knew, but he tended to leave the tactical thinking to his superiors whenever he could. Raf wasn't sure if that was self-doubt or merely adherence to the chain of command. Bumblebee was, after at all, a soldier in the Autobot army (such as it was).

"To do what?" Fina asked, and Raf realized he'd trailed off without meaning to.

"To come back for me," Raf said, "and to become my protector, my guardian. He was willing to risk everything he had left, just for me. He has a family, you know. People who love him, who need him to help them fight just to stay alive, who care about him more than you or I could ever know. And yet, he was willing to set all of that aside, just for me. One person, who -as far as he knew at the time- could not and would not ever be able to give anything back. And he's not just my guardian, Fina... he's also my best friend. And now he's giving that up."

"Why? What for?" Fina asked, not seeming to wonder how Raf knew her name.

"For you, Fina. He's doing this for you."

* * *

 _ **A/N: I've been asked another question I feel needs to be addressed. Someone asked me if I was a therapist or psychologist. The simple answer is no.**_

 _ **The more extended one is this: Whatever small amount I know comes from personal experience, and what I have been told by others. My living situation now and growing up may be slightly different from that of others, since I have a younger sister with Down Syndrome, grandparents who are in their 90s (and definitely experiencing a second childhood) and parents who didn't have children until they were older and had been married many years. I spent the majority of my childhood taking care of my sister, including acting as her guardian in playgrounds where other children would have tormented her had I let them because she was different and children are often cruel. Handling the elderly and the disabled forces one to think outside of themselves and their perspective, to try and understand why these people act as they do, so that they may be helped, and made as comfortable and content as possible.**_

 _ **I also have spent a lifetime communicating with the animals I have kept as pets including cats, dogs, even fish (and a parrot my brother had). Not just ascribing emotions to them or assuming they think in a certain way, but actively trying to discover what makes them frightened or angry or stressed, and how to alleviate those conditions. Again, this has led me to think in ways outside of myself. In his book** "Dog Logic" **, Joel M. McMains explains that when teaching a dog to Heel, we think we're teaching it to stay on our left. But if you begin to walk backwards, your dog will almost certainly go around to your right side so that he is beside you and walking forward while you walk backward. You have actually taught him to keep you on his right. There are other examples, such as the Sit. A dog usually learns he's putting his rear on the ground from a standing position. Therefore, if you tell him to Sit from a Down position, he may look at you as though you've lost your mind. To his way of thinking, he's already performing the Sit, because his rump is still on the ground. Many people will think he is being obstinate and scold, but the best trainers (who must practice a form of psychology to succeed) realize that the dog merely must be trained as if it were a new command, rather than assuming the dog is ignoring a familiar one. The best animal trainers don't merely command their animals, they communicate with them. They understand how an animal thinks so deeply that they can guide it into the appropriate action without prior training or issuing a true command at all.**_

 _ **This is the extent of my psychological knowledge. If I know anything, it is from experience, nothing more.**_

 _ **I hope this answers your question satisfactorily.**_


	21. Run for Shelter

_{That doesn't look good.}_

Rick and Larry had opened up the garage, flooding the interior with bright morning light, but they had not yet begun work and were instead debating where to start when Bumblebee saw the searing green vehicle with black trim coming up the road, slowing as it approached the driveway.

Though neither human could understand what Bee said, Larry seemed to recognize the cadence of warning and looked up, then around. He almost immediately spotted the MECH vehicle.

"Stay here," he told Rick, then stepped from the shadows of the garage out into the sunlight and stood waiting for the car to come to him.

 _{Careful, Larry,}_ Bumblebee burred quietly.

Rick looked like he wanted to argue with his father, or at least question him, but something in either Larry or Bee's tone told him to obey and he stood quietly in the garage, placing a hand on one of Bumblebee's fenders as if to reassure Bee... or possibly himself.

When the green car pulled up, a man rolled down the window. Larry leaned in to speak with him. Bumblebee couldn't catch their words, but Larry's expression was one of a man suddenly in fear for his life, and he more than once glanced in the direction of the garage.

Bumblebee had been around enough to know when an evacuation was about to be ordered. How many times had places he'd been stationed at been compromised? How many times had he seen an Autobot commander's face acquire the expression Larry had now when he heard over the radio that the Decepticons had found them, broken through the defensive lines, and that they would be arriving any moment? He knew the look of prey when it knows the hunter has spotted it.

What he didn't understand was why Larry wore that expression as he turned to walk back to the garage. The green car in the driveway backed out and disappeared down the street, which further confused Bumblebee. Rick evidently saw the look on his father's face, but didn't know what it meant.

"Dad, what is it? What's wrong?"

Larry looked over his shoulder, as if expecting the MECH vehicle to suddenly return. Then he turned back to Rick and said, "You and your sister need to go for a drive in this car."

"What? Why?"

"Just go get her," when Rick hesitated, Larry practically shouted, "NOW, Rick."

Bewildered, but spurred into action by the urgency in his father's tone, Rick left the garage and hurried to the house. Larry watched him go, then turned to look at Bumblebee.

"I suppose you knew all along," Larry sighed.

 _{That MECH would never allow you to keep me here? Yes. I knew.}_

"I got the okay from my boss, but I guess he didn't get the okay from _his_ boss. Somehow, it went up the chain and... well, the long and the short of it is that they want you back."

 _{You said yourself MECH wants power. Did you really think an organization like them would let you have anything that they could use to give themselves an edge? Come on, Larry. You know better.}_

"I'm going to assume you're scolding me for being an idiot," Larry said.

 _{Good guess.}_

"Well I'm not so much an idiot that I don't know what they'd do to you if they ever got hold of you. I mean, I'm sure you remember what happened last time."

 _{I have some vague memory of that, yes...}_ Bumblebee muttered.

"Well, this time they would probably kill you. And... I can't let that happen."

Bumblebee knew Larry kept talking after that, trying to explain or perhaps excuse, but he heard none of it. He saw the deep lines of worry and defeat in Larry's face, heard the tone of resigned fear in his voice. Bumblebee knew these signs better than he knew his own name. Larry was going to have Rick and Fina drive Bumblebee away, while he stayed behind to deal with MECH himself. It was unlikely they would simply have a 'talk'. Not when something as valuable as Bumblebee was on the line.

Bumblebee didn't know what Larry was in the middle of saying when he interrupted, _{You're going to stall them... and they're going to kill you. Larry, I can't let you do that. Not for any reason.}_

"Don't worry," Larry said, "Rick and Fina will have you out of here long before then."

 _{It's not me I'm worried about. Larry, I can't let you do this,}_ Bumblebee knew that the new frantic note in his voice wouldn't help Larry understand him, but he couldn't remain silent.

"You'll be fine."

 _{Larry, no!}_

"Look, don't you get it?" Larry snapped suddenly, "I won't just let them take you. But, if I try to stop them, they'll threaten my kids. Maybe you don't understand this, but MECH will _kill_ them to get to you. I need you to get them out of here, somewhere safe. Even if I don't resist, they may kill me and my family anyway, because of what we know. It wouldn't be the first time MECH has killed one of its own 'for security reasons'. Don't think they wouldn't. You have _no_ idea what they're capable of."

 _{I think I could make a good guess,}_ Bumblebee replied coolly.

Optimus had once compared the people of MECH to Decepticons. It was a comparison Bumblebee had never forgotten, and one which had proven extremely accurate in subsequent encounters. Bee believed Larry when he said that MECH would kill his family just because they'd become an inconvenience. And too, he understood the value humans placed upon children. The future of a world was something Bumblebee understood the value of better than Larry would ever know. On Earth, that future was the children. Without them, there would be no humanity. Children had to be protected at any cost, because within them lay all the possibilities the future had in store.

"Just listen to me," Larry said, "and don't fight Rick or Fina."

Hearing footfalls on the steps, Larry turned and was surprised to see Raf following Fina and Rick.

"Who's that?" Larry asked of Rick when the boy reached him.

"Says his name's Raf," Rick replied, "He was in Fina's room when I went to get her."

"Daddy, what's going on?" Fina asked.

"Just get in the car, sweetheart," Larry told her.

Frowning, she nevertheless obeyed, first waiting for Raf to climb in the back before settling herself in the passenger seat and watching through the windshield as Rick and his father talked. Bumblebee knew they were arguing. Rick was frightened because his father wouldn't explain things to him.

"Bumblebee," Raf spoke from the back seat, distracting him, "what's happening?"

 _{MECH is coming. They want me back,}_ Bumblebee replied quietly.

"We can't let that happen," Raf said hurriedly.

 _{No. Larry's sending his kids away with me. He wants to get them to safety.}_

"But what about him? What about the other person in the house?" Raf must have seen Vera inside when he came out behind Rick and Fina, "What happens to them?"

 _{When they find out I'm not here, MECH will probably take Larry and Vera into custody for questioning. After that...}_ he trailed off.

Raf got the message and sat back heavily.

"What? What did he say?" Fina demanded.

Before Raf could answer, Rick got in the driver's seat, slamming the door behind him.

"Well?" Fina inquired sharply.

"Buckle up," Rick said, sighing and putting on his own seat belt, then whispered for only Bumblebee to hear, "For once, don't give me a hard time, okay? Just follow my lead and do as I tell you."

Bumblebee wasn't certain what that was supposed to mean, but he obediently started his engine and drove out onto the driveway. Rick started to check both ways on the street before pulling out, but he saw the wave of green and black MECH vehicles coming their way.

"Who are they?" Fina wanted to know.

"Bad guys," Rick replied.

"Go!" Raf exclaimed from the back seat, and Rick hit the accelerator.

Bumblebee shot out onto the street, tires slipping on the icy road before finding traction and launching him forward. The MECH vehicles attempted pursuit, but it was evident almost immediately that Bumblebee was the faster vehicle. In the rear view mirror, it was possible to see that some of the MECH vehicles had not pursued and instead stopped and turned into the driveway Bee had just left.

Larry put up his hands when a MECH operative exited his vehicle with a drawn weapon. Two more jogged up the steps to the house. As Bumblebee turned the corner onto the next street moments later, he could see that Vera was being dragged from the house between them. Bumblebee knew that MECH would interrogate Larry and Vera, trying to find out where their children were taking the Autobot. It was something neither Larry nor Vera could answer, because the 'where' had not been specified.

"We have to go back!" Fina screamed, but Rick ignored her until she pushed his shoulder, "They've got Mom and Dad! We have to go back for them!"

"And do what?!" Rick yelled back, then repeated more quietly, "And do what, Fina? What can _we_ do?"

With MECH vehicles still on their tail, they had little choice but to keep going.

Fina, looking urgently over the back of her seat even though the scene at her house was now out of view, began to tremble. Then, resolutely, she turned to face the front and reached into her purse, which she'd picked up on the way out. She withdrew her phone.

"Fina, what are you doing?" Rick asked, but she ignored him and hit a number on speed dial.

A moment later, she was talking into the phone, "Eddy? Eddy, I'm sorry, but I need your help."

"Who's Eddy?" Raf asked of Bumblebee.

 _{Fina's friend. Boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend? Human relationships confuse me, Raf,}_ Bee answered.

"Me too," Raf replied.

 _{I don't know what she thinks Eddy could do for her. The only thing he's got is a fast car, and he borrowed that from her other friend-boyfriend-ex-boyfriend Mark. Actually, I think maybe he stole it.}_

Raf nodded, then smiled slightly, "I think I know what she has in mind, Bee."

* * *

Raf recognized the maroon Noble as it swung in behind them. Though a little worse for wear cosmetically speaking, the super car seemed to almost pour itself onto the road like running liquid. It slid easily through the intersection and fell into place behind them evenly. Raf had always been a car fan, even before he'd met Bumblebee, and a Noble -even a damaged one- was a sight.

Deceptively ordinary in shape, the Noble was nonetheless eye catching. And Raf knew the power that lay under that normal surface. Perhaps more than any other car, the Noble required a skilled driver in a race, though it purred like a kitten on the road. It had few features, almost none at all to aid the driver in its control at high speeds. And it hit high speeds with breathtaking quickness and ease.

Rick noticed the Noble in the mirror and pulled to the side of the road. Their MECH pursuers were momentarily out of sight as they piled out of Bumblebee and met Eddy at the front of his vehicle.

"What do you want, Fina?" Eddy asked, scowling and leaning on the front of his car, "You said it was important, so why am I here?"

Raf listened as Rick and Fina attempted to explain that they were being chased. They didn't know the extent of why, only that it had to do with Bumblebee, and that they didn't want to be caught.

"So what do you expect me to do about it?" Eddy asked, "I'm no better a driver than Rick is, and you seem to have left your pursuers in the dust already."

"Not for long," Rick said.

"Well the Noble only seats two."

"I know that," Fina replied, "What we need is a distraction."

"How can I help?" it seemed to Raf that Eddy's hostility had melted rapidly, perhaps because he grasped that this was life or death and whatever issues he had with Rick and Fina could be put aside for now.

"We need to get the car out of sight," Fina said, "and then let them catch up to us."

"What good will that do?" Eddy wanted to know.

"They need to see one of us, Rick or I, getting into the Noble with you. They'll recognize us, and follow you. They want this car for some reason, and they want it bad. They'll think we left it somewhere to hide it from them."

"But we're actually..." Eddy prompted when she paused.

"We're actually going back. Well, two of us are. You can easily outrun them in the Noble, but don't do that too fast. Keep them on the string awhile. Then, whoever's left in the Urbana has a clear shot at following the rest of those cars to see where they take Mom and Dad."

"And do what?" Eddy asked, "It's not like you can rescue them yourself."

"Maybe not, but I can call the police with their location, right?"

"What do you mean 'I'?" Rick spoke up for the first time in awhile, "You're not going back."

"Ricky," Fina began.

"No."

"Hear me out," Fina told him, "Look, we both know I can't move fast. Whoever gets into the Noble needs to be clearly identified before they do that. Which means letting those guys get close. Besides, even one handed I'm a better driver than you on your best day."

"What about the kid?" Eddy inquired, nodding towards Raf.

"I go where Bumblebee goes," Raf asserted before anyone could say anything, "I'm not leaving him."

"All this for a car?" Eddy shook his head.

"All this for my best friend," Raf corrected.


	22. All as One

Fina was right: she could not have moved quickly enough to get inside the Noble once the MECH forces arrived. Bumblebee had been parked next to someone's driveway, behind some bushes where he was unlikely to be noticed, but where Fina could see when the MECH vehicles came rushing past. And come they did. When they finally spotted the Noble parked with engine running beside the road, they accelerated, and Rick barely had time to bounce into the passenger seat. Eddy didn't even give him the opportunity to shut the door before he launched the car, which sent up smoke and then charged down the street with a smooth efficiency that even Bumblebee had to envy.

"This isn't a good idea," Raf said, now in the passenger seat and strapped in.

"It's the only one I've got," Fina replied.

They waited in silence until the MECH vehicles disappeared over the horizon. Then, cautiously in case there was a chase car following, Fina edged Bumblebee out from behind the bushes, rolled onto the driveway and hesitated at the threshold between drive and street. A beat passed, then another, then she finally pulled onto the road, and turned back the way they'd come.

"They're going to notice us," Raf persisted, "We're driving the car they're looking for."

"If they do, then they'll have to chase us again. And we already proven we can outrun them."

Bumblebee might have wondered where she got her confidence, had he not already been driven by her hand. He knew what she could do. But he also knew what she could not do. Fina was a race driver, she was not experienced in the dangerous art of stalking the enemy. Even had she been, there was no place to hide on the road and they were in full view of the MECH operatives as they turned onto the street where she lived.

Bumblebee had not anticipated that they would still be in the driveway, though he almost immediately understood why they were there. They had expected him to turn back, and they had a plan in place. It also became obvious to him how the higher ups in MECH had found out that Larry had him.

There, among the green MECH vehicles, was the black car from the racetrack. Larry and Vera were in the back seat of the modified Viper, and it was evident they assumed that Bumblebee had (or soon would have) reinforcements, because its driver floored it and took off.

The Viper roared like a lion, exhibiting none of the grace but all of the power of the Noble as it took the sharp incline of the driveway like a surfer catching a wave and shot onto the street with a squeal as its tires interacted with the ice on the road and then it sped away.

Bumblebee didn't know what value Larry and Vera might have if not to tell where Bee was. Since he was here, MECH didn't need to ask that. But they might want to know who all knew about Bumblebee's existence, they might use Larry and Vera as hostages, or they might simply kill them just to make sure that what Larry and Vera knew was never made public. And not just about Bumblebee, but about MECH as a whole. There was no telling what information Larry had been privy to up to now. MECH wouldn't want anyone in their employ to fall into enemy hands.

Fina either forgot that she was supposed to be tailing them to see where MECH would take her parents or else she understood that MECH no longer had reason to keep them alive. Either way, she accelerated. Bumblebee hesitated to respond, knowing that he couldn't protect her or Raf, that the only thing keeping them from danger was MECH's assumption that Bee had backup following him, that they had to lose him before his allies caught up with him.

"Please," Fina whispered to him, leaning close to the steering wheel, "I know we haven't done a thing to deserve it, and that you have every reason to hate all of us, and no reason to risk yourself to save them... but _please_ , help me do this. I need your help. Please."

The Fina he had met days ago would never have said such things to him. He knew that something had changed her, had humbled her, and made her realize that she herself was not the only person who mattered. She had come to see what she must always have known. And her request was one he could not deny, even though his reasons for considering it were not what she thought.

Bumblebee's tires caught the pavement and he sped up, extending himself cautiously, all too aware of the treacherous ice over which he was racing. Fina was aware of it as well, and knew as he did that the road ahead was not as straight as it appeared, and was also narrower than it seemed.

There was more ice on the road here than there had been at the race track, and Bumblebee would not normally have exceeded forty miles an hour on such a road, particularly not when he couldn't correct himself if he began to slide. Even Cybertronians were not immune to fishtailing in vehicle mode. They just usually had the option of transforming if necessary, and being able to take the impact if it came to that because they didn't normally have to worry about fragile human passengers.

But Fina's plea rang in his ears, and the black Viper's driver was obviously not going to respect the laws of nature. To keep up, Bumblebee had to exceed any speed which might be considered safe in these road conditions and hope that Fina would be able to maintain control in case he started to slide. Because Bumblebee could partially ignore her directions, she was less at risk of overcompensating than a normal driver would be. Fina seemed to understand this, and trusted Bumblebee, giving him maximum control by asking him to fully accelerate and turning the wheel more than would be wise in an ordinary car when needed so that he could choose how fast to go and how much to turn inasmuch as it was possible under the circumstances. She didn't touch the breaks, knowing Bee could slow himself better than she could, given what they were doing.

A high speed pursuit on winter roads was not what he would have wanted, especially since he was chasing a car that -no matter how modified or souped up- was still just a car with an entirely human driver. And he certainly didn't like that both himself and the other car had innocent passengers. But this had been his blunder, though he didn't have time to sort out which was his first mistake this time, and he didn't want Larry or Vera (or their children!) to suffer for it.

In turning back and revealing himself to MECH, he had changed the nature of this deadly game. He now had no choice but to either concede to failure or play things out as they were now. And the latter meant outrunning that other vehicle; something he had twice been unable to do at the race track.

But there was a big difference between then and now. Then, Fina had been controlling him, making every move as if he had no consciousness or judgment of the situation. Now she was working with him, granting him the freedom to move, and therefore the confidence to accelerate as he had not dared to before for fear of becoming involved in an uncontrolled spin or worse. He had not been willing to reach for his limits because the risk was too great. Now it seemed likely that it was the only thing which could possibly save Larry and Vera, though he wasn't presently sure _how_ that would be accomplished.

The Viper was the faster vehicle design, and now Bumblebee knew that some part of its modifications had probably been done by MECH engineers, who had more than once studied Cybertronian physiology, and that put them light-years ahead of anyone else in designing sturdy, fast cars, meaning that this Earth vehicle might be able to hold its own against Bumblebee even in a fair race. Its disadvantage came only in the form of its driver and the extra weight of three grown people it was carrying versus Bumblebee's much lighter load of only two people, both of which were small.

On the other hand, Bumblebee was not his usual self, in more ways than one. The injury he had sustained in the wreck had begun to heal, but this drive was definitely going to undo that. The difficult turns, and high, sustained speed coupled with the grueling iced road conditions combined to make it a strain on him even had he started off healthy. The black Viper, not being a living thing, could feel no pain, and merely replacing any parts that had been damaged racing ensured a full recovery. The Viper was probably in as good a shape as it had been at the start of the first race, whereas Bumblebee was seriously beginning to show signs of wear.

Though the green MECH vehicles made attempts to slow Bumblebee, they weren't quick enough and were almost immediately left trailing behind. After the first couple of turns on the mercifully deserted roads, the green cars disappeared from his rear view. He was sure they were still back there, but for the moment he had only one vehicle and its driver to worry about.

It was all he could worry about anyway. The vehicle was overall faster, and he found himself struggling against the ice and snow on the roads, fighting just to keep up. He didn't have the time or energy to devote to thinking about what he would do if he ever did manage to catch up or overtake the other vehicle. He knew he'd have to stop it somehow, but he had little means of fighting if it came to that.

The seconds passed like minutes, each one a trial with its own unique challenge. He found himself sliding and fought to right his course with Fina's cooperation. He managed not to spin and regained his equilibrium. In the next second, the Viper started to fishtail and he cut his acceleration to avoid colliding with it while its driver fought to right it. Once it straightened out, he tried to take the opportunity to pass and block it, but the Viper's driver was having none of it and wouldn't let him pass.

Bumblebee was so preoccupied that he didn't even realize Raf was on the phone until the boy began shouting street names. He wasn't sure what Raf was doing or who he was talking to, but he hoped to God that the boy was getting them some kind of help, because he wasn't sure how long he could keep up this increasingly dangerous game of tag. The streets had been deserted so far, but how long could their luck hold out in that department? Inevitably, someone had to be on the road somewhere.

"Yes, Fowler! Agent Fowler!" Raf cried suddenly, pausing as he got a response, "Because it's not Decepticons! It's MECH, humans!... Yes, I know I mentioned a car, but it has a driver... Ratchet... just, just..." he took a breath to calm himself, "Just tell Optimus where we are, let him make the call," Ratchet must have said he was tracking them by the GPS in Raf's phone because the boy stopped shouting street names as they crossed them.

It wasn't for no reason that Raf was shouting. The noise of Bumblebee's engine, coupled with screeching tires on the ground and crunch of snow and ice under his treads made hearing what anyone was saying virtually impossible. The deafening noise was a warning that he was reaching the limits of what he could do. He could feel his tires losing traction and beginning to wobble dangerously, and he was sure Fina could feel it through the steering wheel.

"We have to set him free!" Raf shouted above the racket.

"What?" Fina yelled back, so Raf repeated.

"I know you're doing all you can, Fina," he continued as loudly as he could, "But Bee needs to have full control or this is going to end with all of us being killed!"

 _{You can do that?}_ Bumblebee asked, not quite daring to hope, _{While I'm moving?}_

"Bee, I can't hear you!" Raf shouted, "Just trust me on this."

 _{Always, Raf,}_ Bumblebee replied, _{Always.}_

"If you set him loose, I won't have any control anymore," Fina said, and her voice held fear in it.

Raf had unbuckled and crawled partway under the dash.

"You'll just have to trust him," Raf's voice came muffled as he popped off the cover and looked at the mess of wiring underneath, "Completely."

"I've never trusted anybody that much!" Fina said, but Raf didn't seem to hear her.

Bumblebee felt it as wires came loose, and he also felt the surge of fresh power as he found himself freed from the mechanical equivalent of a bridle at last. The momentary distraction made him skip across the road, and Fina reflexively pulled the wheel, effectively regaining his attention.

Raf pushed himself up into his seat and belted in, then said, "You can still fight him for control. So now it's up to you. You have to let go of the wheel, Fina. You have to let Bumblebee go."


	23. Hope Has Been Restored

Gradually, Fina released her death grip on the wheel. She took her foot off the pedal and sat back stiffly, terror etched into her face and evident in her every movement and especially her rapid, shallow breathing. But she _did_ let go.

 _{Hang on!}_ Bumblebee growled above the din of his own toiling engine.

Raf translated his instruction to Fina as Bumblebee unleashed the raw power that was now his to command. Fina reflexively reached for the wheel, but checked herself and pulled back as Bumblebee shot forward like a newly fired rocket and rapidly began to close the gap between himself and the black MECH vehicle. Bee felt his injury tearing and knew he was losing energon again, but he did not permit that to distract him and his focus on the road and vehicle ahead remained absolute.

"Watch out!" Raf's warning came just in time.

Because it was off the side of the road, Bumblebee didn't notice the Ground Bridge opening. Had Raf not warned him, he would have rammed straight into Optimus as the Prime drove out onto the road. Raf's warning gave him time to swerve. The ice on the road betrayed Bumblebee and he fishtailed around the looming shape of his leader, almost falling into a fatal spin before managing to right himself. He knew that he was in still trouble.

Ratchet must have miscalculated the speed of the Viper, and opened the Ground Bridge a hair too late. There was no chance of doing it again. Once was risky enough, even on an apparently deserted road. They were still in town, and if they tried it twice someone was bound to notice.

Optimus could never outrun the Viper, and Arcee's two wheels were a fatal disadvantage on ice. In addition to having only two wheels and an entirely different sort of tire, Arcee had no chance to get accustomed to driving on the ice before she was on it. With this race already underway, she couldn't possibly get her bearings fast enough to catch up. The Viper was getting away.

Bumblebee had himself righted on the road almost as soon as he'd started sliding. He didn't pause to see if Optimus was going to give him instruction, he didn't dare. If he slowed down now, it would take him too long to get back up to speed. He had to overtake the Viper and force the driver to turn around.

"Go, Bee, go!" Raf urged unnecessarily, not seeming conscious of speaking aloud.

Bumblebee knew it was now or never. If he did not overtake the other vehicle fast enough, the other Autobots would fall too far behind to do anything and Bumblebee would be on his own again, still with only unarmed humans and no ability to transform. So he made the choice to throw caution to the blasting cold wind that whistled against him and see just how fast he could really go.

The Viper had wobbled slightly at the abrupt appearance of a giant semi-truck on a previously deserted road, but the driver had quickly recovered. But evidently Bumblebee gaining on him unsettled the driver, who must have thought Bumblebee was already pushed to the limit before.

The driver had raced him before. Twice, actually.

But that had been when Bumblebee was driving under restraint. Now he was free, and he was not letting the Viper get away. Everything that had happened since Larry kidnapped him had come down to this one moment. It wasn't just Larry and Vera's lives on the line, but their children who so desperately needed them. Larry was just learning to be a father, he and Rick had just started building a relationship that would last a lifetime, Fina was just starting to show the beginnings of humility and compassion. If Larry and Vera were lost now, so too were Rick and Fina. Not just lives, but souls, were at stake.

Bumblebee was now gasping with effort, his engine struggling to comply with the demand of his will. This was what he had that no Earth vehicle could ever have. He was not just the sum of his parts, and his limits were not defined in the end by mere physical design, but by the strength of his spark, which was something no engineer or scientist could ever measure or recreate.

It was this final surge of sheer willpower that brought him first even with the Viper, and then -inch by painful inch- past it. Even as he nosed ahead, the Viper's driver decelerated, knowing it was finished. The driver wasn't going to fight to the death on this. Bumblebee had won, and would inevitably gain enough ground to get in front of the Viper and force it to slow down. The driver didn't seem interested in that, probably knowing how dangerous and futile the exercise would be for him.

Bumblebee blew ahead and cut in front of the Viper, turning sidelong to block the road. In a matter of seconds, Optimus and Arcee had caught up. Moments later, Agent Fowler had hopped out of Optimus' cab and jogged up to the Viper. He ordered the driver to surrender and get out of the car.

While Fowler was still checking the driver for weapons, Fina leaped out and ran to open the passenger side door to the Viper and check on her parents, seeming to forget her injuries for the moment.

Bumblebee, on the other hand, suddenly became more aware of his. A moan escaped him as pain hit like a sledgehammer blow. He had not only opened his old wound, but exceeded his physical limits in that final stretch, and his body complained bitterly.

"Bee!" Raf exclaimed worriedly, "Are you okay?"

 _{I'll be fine,}_ Bumblebee replied, _{Thanks to you.}_

Raf merely shrugged, "What are friends for?"

* * *

Bumblebee sounded exhausted. When Raf got out, he saw that the Scout's tires seemed partially deflated, or as if he was resting on them more heavily than usual. Raf knew Bumblebee could inflate and deflate his tires at will. Evidently, just now, he didn't have a lot of will left. He was just too tired.

Arcee edged around Agent Fowler and the MECH agent he was arresting, making her way cautiously to where Bumblebee sat. There was a particular way she drove that made it look like she was about to scold him, or tell him that he should have called the Autobots sooner, that they could have helped. But then she rolled to a stop, and her bearing softened as she registered the weariness of her comrade.

"You okay?" she asked, in the soft tone of voice Raf had only ever heard her use when addressing either Bumblebee or Jack.

 _{I will survive,}_ Bumblebee replied, his voice subdued.

It had obviously not escaped his notice that Arcee had come forward with the intention of scolding him, and that she had only barely thought better of it and decided to be gentle with him.

"That was quite a show you put on," Arcee remarked.

 _{It was stupid and reckless and we both know it, Arcee.}_

"I'm not sure what you think you know," Arcee replied evenly, "But what I just saw was you giving it your all to rescue the people who took you prisoner, which is more than I'd've done in your place."

 _{That's because you're the smart one of us.}_

"Well, I admit that I probably wouldn't have done it carrying two humans with me..." Arcee said, turning slightly so she could see Fina and her parents hugging one another, "... but, from the looks of things, the reward was worth the risk."

 _{That remains to be seen,}_ Bumblebee replied cryptically.

Arcee prepared a response, but Raf was distracted by the sight of Fina's father turning to face Optimus, who was still in his vehicle form as all the Autobots were. Raf stepped closer so that he could hear.

"Forgive me," Larry said, "I didn't know what I was doing. I was always told that... that you were just robots, alien yes, but still robots, even less than animals. Machines, meant to be used by any man who could control you. MECH doesn't just see you as the enemy, but as something to be subdued, controlled and mastered for our own benefit. I guess... I always knew some things didn't add up, but I never thought about it... never wanted to."

Optimus' silence was cold. Raf couldn't think of a time when Optimus had withheld any words of wisdom, but it was soon evident that he need say nothing, because Larry already knew.

"I suppose I acted just like them, in a way. Taking what I wanted without regard for the consequences. I took Bumblebee because I wanted him to solve my problems. Of course, it was too much to ask, even was I not guilty of stealing... worse, I took a free person and tried to make him a slave."

Optimus continued to say nothing, giving no indication of even hearing the human pleading forgiveness from him. But it was obvious that, though Optimus had not spoken once since his arrival, Larry knew that this was nonetheless an Autobot, the Autobot leader in fact. That awareness on Larry's part gave lie to any claim of ignorance he might make. He knew the semi-truck he spoke to was alive, and knew also that it was the leader of the others, and that it was to this Autobot that he must make his pitch, because this was the one who had power over his fate.

"I understand now, what I've done, the unforgivable crime I committed against one of your own. I don't deserve anything from you, not even what you've done for me already."

"That's sure the truth," it was not Optimus who spoke, but Arcee, who had returned when she realized that one of the humans was addressing Optimus.

Larry didn't even glance at her, keeping his full attention on Optimus.

"I wouldn't ask for myself, not knowing what I have done to you and yours. But I plead with you for the same reason I took Bumblebee at the start. If you do not help us to hide, MECH will find us again. They will find us, and kill us. So I'm here, begging you not to hold what I have done against my family, my children. Please."

"We know what your kids did," Arcee growled, "They're hardly sweet and innocent."

Larry turned to Arcee then and hung his head, "They are young."

"And that excuses what they did?" Arcee asked.

"They don't know the cost of their choices," Larry persisted, "They don't know what they do to others by their actions," he turned back to Optimus, "And that is why it's so important that they be spared. If MECH comes after us again, and they will, Rick and Fina will be... be killed... without having ever learned... what Bumblebee tried so hard to teach them. What _I_ should have been teaching them."

"It is Agent Fowler who is responsible for human relocation," Optimus spoke at last, his low rumbling voice seeming to fill the space between them, "and it is not I who must forgive you for your transgression, for it was not I who was injured by your actions."

Larry stood there motionless except for his breathing, which was evidenced by the cloud which formed in front of his face whenever he exhaled. Slowly, hesitantly, he turned to where Bumblebee sat. Raf had not noticed when Bee drew closer; somehow the Scout had moved silently, or perhaps Raf had been so busy listening to Larry plead with Optimus to notice the sound of his engine.

Looking at Bee, Larry seemed to find it harder to speak than before. Despite the sheer power of Optimus' presence, it was Bumblebee that Larry feared addressing. Raf could easily see why. Because what had been done had been done to Bee, it was more difficult to directly seek his forgiveness. It was easier to ask someone else, someone who had not suffered the consequences of the fell act.

"Can you forgive me?" Larry asked, his voice barely audible.

Raf knew that, were he in Bumblebee's place, he would not be able to forgive this man for the pain and fear and loneliness that he had endured at this man's hands. He would not be able to find in himself an ounce of goodwill for this man who had so nearly destroyed him, had taken him from his life, his work and his family, taken everything and demanded everything in return.

How could anyone possibly forgive that?

Of course, Bumblebee was not just anyone. He was an Autobot, whose code it was to protect a world that did nothing to deserve it, to fight for a people who would never know he existed (and would have only feared him if they had), to guard a species who did not even realize they needed him.

Whether by his own nature, or the nature of that which he most believed in, Bumblebee had it in him to be kind, to be gentle and caring and compassionate... and forgiving.

 _{It is already forgotten.}_

When Larry looked around for a translation, his eyes fell first on Raf, who repeated Bumblebee's words, his throat tight with emotion as he realized yet again that Bumblebee was the sort of person that he wanted to become, and that he had a very long way to go.

Raf himself wasn't even the victim, yet still he found himself reluctant to forgive these people for what they'd done to Bee, no matter how contrite they were.

Fowler, who had by this time finished arresting the MECH agent, turned to Optimus.

"I've got some backup comin' so I can take this guy in. Don't suppose you'd be willing to take these folks back with you until I'm through? Processing could take awhile, and the girl," he nodded towards Fina, "tells me I've still got to find her brother and boyfriend, and possibly arrest a few more MECH guys."

Raf couldn't see it when Bumblebee looked to Optimus for permission, but he sensed it, and felt the Prime respond. A moment later, appearing spontaneous to anyone not so attuned to Cybertronians as Raf, Bumblebee's passenger side door opened and he sat waiting to carry them home.


	24. Is Your Life the Same?

**_A/N: Upon request, I've updated this chapter with a list of the Christmas songs I used, which is posted at the end of the story. They're not all good songs (what do you expect after three years of this), but they ARE all songs. I didn't include the artist if I didn't know or if it didn't seem to matter lyric-wise (sometimes covers change the lyrics slightly)  
_ Thank you all for reading, Merry Christmas and I hope you enjoy the final chapter of this story. **

* * *

Bumblebee knew he'd never feel about snow the same way again.

Sooner or later, there comes a time for all of us when life takes us to a place we didn't plan for, expect, or even want. There's no way around it, no way not to come to that place, because we find ourselves drawn into it by events and forces beyond our control, maybe even beyond comprehension.

It is here, surrounded by the inescapable unfamiliar that life gives us a choice about what we do. To run, to fight, to hide, to accept, or to find a way forward. It is not our choice where life takes us, but what we do once we get there... that is on each of us in our turn.

Ratchet had been appalled by (and very vocal about) the condition Bumblebee had allowed himself to get into at the hands of the humans. But despite the colorful language Ratchet used to describe the damage, repairs hadn't been difficult or lengthy. Healing had taken more time.

Lawrence, Vera, Richard and Serafina O'Neill were gone long before Bumblebee had recovered, settling into a new home Fowler had arranged for them in Denver.

Though he knew they were physically safe now from the clutches of MECH, he couldn't help but wonder if anything he'd said or done had been enough to save them from themselves. He knew that for all his power and knowledge and experience, he could not make them become better people. They had to do that for themselves. And yet, he still couldn't help but feel responsible. His life had touched theirs, and he knew that made an impact, an alteration, a change. But he knew it was unlikely he would ever find out exactly what kind of lasting effect he might have had upon them. It worried him.

While still at the Autobot base, Fina had called Eddy to make sure he was alright. She had apologized repeatedly, not only for what she'd done but also for dragging him into a dangerous situation. Eddy, clearly still wounded by her betrayal, was nevertheless forgiving. Bumblebee had the feeling that, given the chance, Fina would one day repair the damage she had done to their relationship, at least enough that they would be friends. Clearly, whether Fina knew or accepted it, Eddy loved her, and would do anything for her. That alone was enough to give Bumblebee some hope.

Eddy was safe enough, though Fowler was having someone keep an eye on his house just in case. The only MECH agent who could have recognized the Noble and guessed who its driver was happened to be in custody now. That same agent was the one who'd seen and recognized Bee on the race track, and informed the superior he answered to, who had in turn sent it up the chain until it got back to Larry's (now former) superior. MECH had decided to take Bee back from Larry.

Bumblebee wondered how an organization that allowed small units within itself to initiate full blown capture and retrieval operations without the top brass knowing about it could possibly function. Obviously, based on what had happened here, they didn't function very well. Something told Bumblebee that MECH, at least in its current form, was doomed. Perhaps not soon, but someday. There was hope in that too.

As soon as Ratchet deemed him healthy enough for extended driving, Bumblebee took a trip to Colorado. It was a long drive, probably longer than Ratchet would have liked, but Optimus approved Bumblebee's request. The Prime no doubt understood why Bumblebee needed this.

And Bumblebee was not going alone.

 _{Are you sure your family is okay with this?}_

"They think I'm staying overnight with a friend," Raf answered, "Which is technically true."

 _{What about the holiday?}_

"Christmas isn't for another few days, Bee. And you can drive straight through, right?"

 _{Right,}_ Bumblebee replied, only slightly mollified.

"Besides, it's not like we'll be staying long, is it?"

 _{No,}_ Bumblebee answered, _{Not long.}_

In truth, he wasn't sure if they'd be staying at all. Bumblebee was concerned about what kind of reception they might receive, and had considered just driving past the house to make sure the O'Neills were okay and getting settled in alright. He hadn't originally planned on bringing Raf with him, but the boy had managed to convince him that his family wouldn't miss him too much, then had finally said "You're my best friend, and I just got you back. You're not going anywhere alone."

In his past, Bumblebee might have found it amusing that a tiny, fragile human thought he needed their protection. But he knew better than to laugh now. He had come to know that the humans, like himself, had the capacity to exceed or get around their physical limitations through their ingenuity, courage and strength of will. Raf had saved him before, he would not doubt that the boy might do it again someday.

And besides, he appreciated having the company.

They started off in the evening, so Bumblebee could drive all night. Raf spent many of those hours sleeping across the back seats. Bumblebee didn't mind. There was something comforting in the sight of a human sleeping peacefully, something reassuring in the quiet of the night with the road rolling out ahead and the stars up above, the same stars he'd seen every night since he got here. The same stars, yet he never got tired of seeing them, and they never lost their novelty in his eyes because they told him that he was on Earth, a world he had come to love more than life, and to see as his home.

He drove slowly, because the road was icy in many places, and some places had not even been plowed and so snow lay like a blanket across the pavement. For any ordinary Earth vehicle, that would have forced them to take an alternate route, but Bumblebee just took to the snow and drove through it. But he didn't go fast, because he didn't want to risk so much as a little slide, even though he could now transform and protect himself if he did lose control. He could even transform carefully enough to make sure Raf was also protected. But he didn't want it to come to that, and so was careful.

Sometime in the night, clouds moved in so that when the sun rose it reflected off them and turned the sky to fire blazing orange and gold, the snow cold fields a furnace red and distant mountains to deep pink hues which burned into crimson as the sun began to climb higher. The effect was startling in its intensity, and in its beauty. In minutes, the trees along the sides of the rose had turned yellow, and the fires of sunrise swept across the ground and road ahead, chasing the shadows of night before them.

The transition from darkness into light was sudden, and Raf woke up in time to see it.

"Wow," Raf breathed, pressing his nose against the glass of Bee's window so he could see out.

It was the only thing either of them said for some time.

To those who listen, it is often the silence which speaks most clearly.

* * *

Raf's family seldom went on road trips because it was impractical and unaffordable for them all to go, so he appreciated Bumblebee's eternal willingness to take him along on drives. Bumblebee seemed to enjoy his company, and -if he wasn't going anywhere dangerous- he never failed to call Raf and ask him if he wanted to come. The other advantage of going with Bee was there was never any overcrowding because it was just the two of them, or else one of the other Autobots was along with their own human companion (which still left plenty of space in the back seat; a rare luxury for the smallest child in a large family, and one Raf never ceased to appreciate).

Bumblebee seemed to be feeling fine for most of the drive. But as they neared the new home of the O'Neills, his demeanor shifted. Though he maintained speed and continued to follow the rules of the road as he'd learned them, there was something newly hesitant, almost wary about him. Raf knew Bumblebee wasn't picking up on any real threat, otherwise he'd have stopped and let Raf off while they were still some distance from the house. The nervousness he showed was therefore probably of a personal nature. Perhaps his time as the captive of these people had affected him more than he'd let on.

"What's wrong, Bee?" Raf asked, leaning forward between the front seats to look through the windshield to see the clear road, no cars coming their way at all.

 _{Nothing,}_ Bumblebee replied, but his normally steady burr quavered slightly.

"C'mon, Bee. It's me. I know you. You're worried about something."

 _{I don't know what to do,}_ Bumblebee admitted, _{What should I say to them?}_

Raf thought for a moment. He knew Bumblebee was worried not only about showing up unannounced, but also the fact that it was almost Christmas; a holiday he had heretofore been unable to comprehend on any meaningful level. Besides, what did you say when you visited former captors? Raf doubted any etiquette book in the world covered the appropriate greeting for strangers who'd once locked you in their garage and forced you into dangerous and illegal street racing.

"I don't think you have to worry about that, Bee," Raf said finally, as Bumblebee slowly rolled to a stop at the edge of the road in front of the house which was their destination.

They could see through the front window to a living room, where the television was on. The family of four was all piled on the couch together, huddling under a couple of blankets shared between them, watching a Christmas special on TV. To the left of the couch and right of the television, there was a fire going in the fire place, which was sending swirls of smoke out through the chimney.

"I think maybe everything that needs to be said, already has been."

Bumblebee didn't say anything for a time, observing the family together with their mugs of hot chocolate with marshmallows, the fire crackling in its place, the mantle with its stockings hung and a small village scene set up above them, a small pre-lit Christmas tree glowing in the corner.

Everything in the house was new. Including the people. Watching them, Bumblebee seemed to understand that they were not the same four people he had first met, and whom Raf had never seen but only heard of. Their lives had been changed forever, and they didn't need Bumblebee anymore.

 _{I think I understand now,}_ Bumblebee said finally, pulling back onto the road and driving away.

"Understand what, Bee?" Raf asked.

 _{What Christmas is.}_

"That puts you ahead of most humans," Raf told him.

 _{Really?}_ Bee inquired, sounding surprised.

"Sure. Most people think it's about decorations, toys, gifts, making cookies and listening to carols and watching whatever their special Christmas themed movie is, drinking hot chocolate and eating food and taking naps and all that other stuff. And all that stuff is great," Raf paused here, realizing for the first time that he'd had it wrong all along himself, because he'd wanted so much to be included in these very things that his family participated in that he'd missed the truth his whole life, "Don't get me wrong, it's great. Being with family, near and dear ones, it's really wonderful."

Bumblebee didn't pressure him when he stopped speaking, instead waiting quietly. Perhaps he realized that he had unintentionally given Raf new insight.

"But it isn't about that at all. It's not even about what physical gifts we can give. Not how other people make us feel, but how _we_ choose to feel about _them_ , and how we treat them. You gave those people the greatest Christmas present anyone ever could give, Bee," Raf said, "Because you gave forgiveness."

 _{Is that so unusual?}_ Bumblebee asked.

"It shouldn't be."

 _It shouldn't be.  
_

* * *

 _Then ringing, singing on its way  
_ _The world revolved from night to day  
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime  
Of peace on earth, good will to men.  
_ _ **–**_ _ **I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day**_

* * *

 _ **List of songs used:  
**_ _ **Chapter 1: Fool's Holiday by All Time Low  
Chapter 2: Magical Christmas Train  
Chapter 3: Christmas Lights by Coldplay  
Chapter 4: O Holy Night  
Chapter 5: Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)  
Chapter 6: Merry Christmas, Kiss My Ass by All Time Low  
Chapter 7: I Was Thinking I Could Clean Up For Christmas by Aimee Mann  
Chapter 8: Christmases When You Were Mine by Taylor Swift  
Chapter 9: Happy Xmas (War is Over) by John Lennon  
Chapter 10: Christmas Just Ain't Christmas Without the One You Love by the O'Jays  
Chapter 11: Christmas Eve Can Kill You by The Everly Brothers  
Chapter 12: Every Year, Every Christmas by Luther Vandross  
Chapter 13: Someday at Christmas by Stevie Wonder  
Chapter 14: Do They Know It's Christmas? by Band Aid  
Chapter 15: Faith in Santa by Red Sovine  
Chapter 16: Last Christmas by WHAM!  
Chapter 17: There Will Be No Christmas by Crown the Empire  
Chapter 18: Ave Maria (translated, one variation anyway)  
Chapter 19: Little Drummer Boy  
Chapter 20: Mary, Did You Know?  
Chapter 21: I Won't Be Home for Christmas by Blink-182  
Chapter 22: Anno Domine by Trans-Siberian Orchestra  
Chapter 23: God is With Us by Casting Crowns  
Chapter 24: Back to a Reason (part II) by Trans-Siberian Orchestra**_


End file.
